Systems and methods for navigating internet appliances using a media guidance application

ABSTRACT

Systems and methods for navigating through activity information using a media guidance application are provided. An Internet appliance is integrated with a plurality of content sources accessible to user equipment. A simultaneous display of a first plurality of media asset listings, corresponding to a first plurality of media assets transmitted by each of the plurality of content sources during a first time interval that includes the present time, and information received from the Internet appliance is generated. In response to a user request to navigate to a second time interval that precedes the present time, a simultaneous display of a second plurality of media asset listings, corresponding to a second plurality of media assets that were transmitted by each of the plurality of content sources during the second time interval, and a timeline that includes indicators representing activity detected by the Internet appliance during the second time interval is generated.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Application No.62/560,654, filed Sep. 19, 2017, which is hereby incorporated byreference herein in its entirety.

BACKGROUND

Internet connected appliances and devices are now commonly used in everyhousehold. Users tend to rely on these devices to get notifications andmonitor activity in real time throughout the day. Internet connectedappliances and devices include cameras, doorbells, lights, motionsensors and any component that captures activity and sends the activityover the Internet to a remote server for a user to access using awebsite or application. The appliances may include mobile phone camerasthat are capturing live video from a given user (e.g., a user's livefeed).

Currently, in order to access activity or content provided by theappliances for different vendors, the user needs to access a website orapplication (app) associated with each vendor or appliance. For example,if a user is watching television and decides to view the activity of anInternet appliance, the program guide application has to be terminatedin order to free up the resources to launch the application for thegiven Internet appliance. When the user wants to return to watchingtelevision, the given Internet appliance application has to beterminated to relaunch the program guide application and display theprogram the user was watching. Constantly switching contexts between theprogram guide application and the specific Internet applianceapplication in order to access desired content (from the program guideor from the Internet appliance) is tedious, inefficient and disrupts theviewing experience and enjoyment of the user.

SUMMARY

Accordingly, systems and methods for navigating Internet appliancesusing a media guidance application are provided. For example, the mediaguidance application may be implemented on user equipment (e.g., aset-top box). The media guidance application may search a user's homenetwork to detect any available Internet appliances. The media guidanceapplication may present a drag-and-drop interface to allow the user toselect which of the detected devices to integrate with the contentsources accessible by the user equipment. For example, once selected,the media guidance application may assign virtual channels to theselected detected Internet appliances and may treat those appliances asany ordinary content source (e.g., channel). Any functionality typicallyavailable for the user to perform with the content sources (e.g.,television channels) may become available to the user to perform withthe integrated Internet appliances.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may present a gridguide that includes media asset listings for content received from alist of the content sources (e.g., television channels) and informationthat is received from any of the integrated Internet appliances. Theuser may browse through the listings and appliance information to viewpast content. For example, the user may request to view listings ofcontent that was transmitted by the content sources on a previous day.The media guidance application may display, in the grid guide, thoselistings of the previously transmitted content on the previous daytogether with a timeline representing activity detected by theintegrated Internet appliances on the previous day. The user may selectany of the activities presented in the grid guide of the previouslytransmitted content to view content representing those activities. Byunifying the information available from Internet appliances with contentsource information, the user is provided with a seamless browsingexperience of accessing content without having to close one application(e.g., the media guidance application) to access content from anotherapplication (e.g., an app for a selected Internet appliance).

In some embodiments, a first Internet appliance, external to the userequipment, may be integrated with a plurality of content sourcesaccessible to the user equipment. For example, the user may select aNEST video camera as the first Internet appliance that is detected inthe home network. The media guidance application may assign a virtualchannel (e.g., channel 102) determined to be available to the selectedNEST video camera and thereby integrate the selected camera with othercontent sources (e.g., channels 1-100).

The media guidance application may generate a simultaneous display of afirst plurality of media asset listings, corresponding to a firstplurality of media assets transmitted by each of the plurality ofcontent sources during a first time interval that includes the presenttime, and information received from the first Internet appliance. Forexample, the user may select an option to view a set of listings for thecurrent time. In response, the media guidance application may present agrid guide that includes listings for a plurality of content sources(e.g., channels 1-100) and that includes information for the selectedInternet appliance (e.g., the NEST video camera). The listings mayrepresent content transmitted by the plurality of sources in the presenttime (e.g., today at 7 PM). The information for the selected Internetappliance may include current activity or lack thereof detected by theappliance, type of appliance, location information and/or video receivedfrom the Internet appliance.

The media guidance application may receive a user request to navigate toa second time interval that includes a period of time that precedes thepresent time. For example, the user may navigate a cursor to the left toreach an earlier time period (e.g., today at 5-6 PM) that precedes thecurrent time (e.g., today at 7 PM). The media guidance application may,in response to receiving the user request to navigate to the previoustime period, generate a simultaneous display of a second plurality ofmedia asset listings, corresponding to a second plurality of mediaassets that were transmitted by each of the plurality of content sourcesduring the second time interval, and a first timeline that includesindicators representing activity detected by the first Internetappliance during the second time interval. For example, the mediaguidance application may update the display to present listings ofcontent transmitted earlier today between 5-6 PM by the plurality ofsources. The media guidance application may display together with thesepast listings, a timeline representing activity detected by the selectedInternet appliance. For example, the media guidance application mayreceive indications of motion/sounds detected by the NEST video cameraalong with timepoints at which the motion/sounds were detected. Themedia guidance application may identify which of the motion/sounds weredetected at the selected previous time of 5-6 PM. The media guidanceapplication may present a timeline with indicators at each point between5-6 PM at which the motion/sounds were detected as the information inthe grid row for the selected Internet appliance. The indicators maydiffer depending on the type of activity they represent (e.g., redindicators may identify motion and blue indicators may identify sounds).

In some embodiments, in order to generate the timeline of activitydetected by the first Internet appliance, the media guidance applicationmay search a database associated with the first Internet appliance toidentify activity detected by the first Internet appliance during thesecond time interval. For example, the media guidance application maytransmit a request to a server associated with the selected Internetappliance. The request may identify the second time interval and requestactivity information (including any video clips) that was detectedduring the second time interval. For example, the media guidanceapplication may contact the NEST server to obtain information about theNEST video camera that was selected as the first Internet appliance. Themedia guidance application may provide login credentials of the userassociated with the NEST video camera. The NEST server may search itsdatabase for the requested content and return to the media guidanceapplication the requested activity information. The media guidanceapplication may assemble this information into a timeline including theappropriate indicators of activity. In some implementations, the mediaguidance application may contact the NEST video camera directly over thelocal network to obtain the information about the activity detectedduring the second time interval. The media guidance application mayassemble this information received directly from the NEST video camerainto a timeline including the appropriate indicators of activity.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may perform a seriesof steps to integrate the selected Internet appliance. For example, themedia guidance application may detect on a network local to the userequipment a plurality of Internet appliances. For example, the mediaguidance application may issue a discovery command over a local areanetwork. Any Internet appliance that receives the discovery command mayrespond with its address and various other parameters (e.g., device ID,functions, manufacturer, etc.). The media guidance application maydetermine a type, identifier, and manufacturer of each of the detectedplurality of Internet appliances based on an address of each of thedetected plurality of Internet appliances received in the response tothe discovery command. The media guidance application may generate fordisplay in a first display region a list of detected Internet appliancesthat includes the first Internet appliance. For example, the mediaguidance application may present a dropdown menu listing each appliancethat was detected along with the device parameters (e.g., device ID,manufacturer, functions, etc.). The user may provide login informationto the media guidance application for each different manufacturer listedfor each appliance that was detected.

The media guidance application may receive user input that drags thefirst Internet appliance from the first display region to a seconddisplay region. In response to receiving the user input dragging theidentifier of the given appliance from one region of the display to theother, the media guidance application may identify a channel space ofthe user equipment that includes a plurality of content source channelsassociated with the plurality of content sources and a plurality ofvirtual channels associated with Internet appliances. For example, themedia guidance application may access a stored list of channels thatincludes a set of channels provided by the user's cable provider and alist of virtual channels that are unassigned or available to use forexternal appliances. The channels provided by the cable provider allowaccess to content that is broadcast/cablecast by the content provider tomultiple users at scheduled times. The virtual channels are channelsthat provide access to local user devices. The media guidanceapplication may search the virtual channels to identify a first virtualchannel that is not currently assigned to an Internet appliance. Forexample, the media guidance application may search the virtual channelsto determine whether a stored indication is present for a given virtualchannel identifying an Internet appliance associated with that channel.The media guidance application may modify the channel space to associatethe first virtual channel with the first Internet appliance byassociating a virtual channel number, the determined identifier, type,and/or manufacturer with the first Internet appliance.

In some implementations, the first Internet appliance may be a user'sInternet video camera. For example, the first Internet appliance may bea NEST camera the user installed in their living room. The NEST cameramay be a camera that continuously captures video and uploads thecaptured video to a NEST server for storage for a predetermined periodof time (e.g., 10 days or longer based on a subscription). Access to theNEST camera feed is available to the user by logging in to the NEST appor website and selecting the designated camera (e.g., living roomcamera). In such implementations, the media guidance application maypresent, together with video received from a first of the contentsources, a browse region in which content information is presented for asecond of the content sources associated with a current channel number.For example, the media guidance application may present video that isbeing broadcast to a plurality of users and is being received on a givenchannel (e.g., NBC). The media guidance application may present anavigable region (e.g., as an overlay), together with the video that isbeing broadcast, that allows the user to view information for otherchannels (e.g., other content source channels or other virtualchannels).

The media guidance application may receive user input to navigate to asubsequent content source in a list of content sources, wherein thesubsequent content source is associated with a channel number that ishigher or lower in a sequence of channels. For example, the mediaguidance application may present information (e.g., schedulinginformation including title and broadcast times of media assets) forchannel 99 (e.g., a content source channel, FOX). The media guidanceapplication may receive a user input to navigate to a higher channel(e.g., channel 100). The media guidance application may determine thatthe next higher channel (e.g., channel 100) is a virtual channel that isassociated with the first Internet appliance. The media guidanceapplication, in response, may present in the browse region informationassociated with the first Internet appliance and live video beingreceived by the first Internet appliance. For example, the mediaguidance application may present identifier, type, and/or manufacturerof the first Internet appliance and a live video feed being captured bythe first Internet appliance (e.g., in a window inside the browseregion).

In some implementations, the media guidance application may receive auser request to perform a trick play operation on the live videopresented in the browse region. In response to receiving the userrequest, the media guidance application retrieves stored videoassociated with the first Internet appliance that includes videocaptured by the first Internet appliance at a time in the past. Forexample, the media guidance application may determine the manufacturerassociated with the first Internet appliance displayed in the browseregion. The media guidance application may access stored usercredentials associated with the manufacturer. The media guidanceapplication may access the first Internet appliance (directly or via theserver associated with the first Internet appliance) using the storeduser credentials. For example, the media guidance application maycommunicate with the NEST server associated with the NEST camera toprovide the user's credentials and request a stored video feed of videocaptured by the NEST camera. The stored video feed may be based on howfar back the user rewinds the video shown in the browse region. In someimplementations, the video feed from the first Internet appliance may bestored (periodically or continuously) on the user equipment on which themedia guidance application is implemented (e.g., the DVR or set-topbox). In such circumstances, in response to receiving the user requestto perform the trick play operation on the video shown in the browseregion, the media guidance application may retrieve and display in thebrowse region the stored video from the local storage devicecorresponding to the user requested position.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may receive a userselection of an option to view a list of integrated Internet appliancesincluding the first Internet appliance. For example, the media guidanceapplication may receive a user selection of the MENU button on a remotecontrol or a selection of a SHOW APPLIANCES button on a remote control.In response to receiving the selection, the media guidance applicationmay determine a manufacturer of each integrated Internet appliance inthe list. For example, the media guidance application may access a listof previously detected appliances on the local network. The mediaguidance application may retrieve from the list the stored manufacturerof each appliance. The media guidance application may generate a firstset of integrated Internet appliances associated with a firstmanufacturer and a second set of integrated Internet appliancesassociated with a second manufacturer. For example, the media guidanceapplication may identify all the detected appliances having the samefirst manufacturer (e.g., NEST) and generate a first set of Internetappliances associated with NEST (e.g., NEST camera 1, NEST camera 2,NEST doorbell, etc.). The media guidance application may identify allthe detected appliances having the same second manufacturer (e.g., RING)and generate a first set of Internet appliances associated with RING(e.g., RING camera 1, RING doorbell, etc.).

The media guidance application may generate for display a plurality ofrows, wherein a first of the plurality of rows is associated with thefirst manufacturer, and where a second of the plurality of rows isassociated with the second manufacturer. The media guidance applicationmay generate for display, in the first row, a first plurality of cellseach representing content associated with each of the first set ofintegrated Internet appliances and generate for display, in the secondrow, a second plurality of cells each representing content associatedwith each of the second set of integrated Internet appliances. Forexample, in a row for the NEST manufacturer, the media guidanceapplication may present three cells, one for each detected applianceassociated with the NEST manufacturer (e.g., a cell for NEST camera 1, acell for NEST camera 2, and a cell for NEST doorbell). For example, in arow for the RING manufacturer, the media guidance application maypresent two cells, one for each detected appliance associated with theRING manufacturer (e.g., a cell for RING camera 1, and a cell for RINGdoorbell). In each cell, the media guidance application may include anyone of the following: live video captured by the correspondingappliance, information associated with the appliance, and/or an activitytimeline of recent activity detected by the given appliance.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may display videofrom a first of the content sources. For example, the media guidanceapplication may present video that is being broadcast to a plurality ofusers and is being received on a given channel (e.g., NBC). The mediaguidance application may receive data from the first Internet applianceindicating that the first Internet appliance detected activity. Forexample, the NEST camera may transmit a notification to the NEST serverindicating that motion was detected. In such circumstances, the mediaguidance application may periodically poll the NEST server to detectsuch activity that was reported to the NEST server. Alternatively, theNEST server may transmit notifications it receives from the NEST camerato the media guidance application associated with the user account.Alternatively, the NEST camera may transmit a notification to the mediaguidance application directly indicating that motion was detected. Inresponse to detecting such activity, the media guidance application maypresent a notification associated with the first Internet appliance thatincludes the received data simultaneously with the video from the firstof the content sources, wherein the data includes an image of thedetected activity and a description of the detected activity. Forexample, the media guidance application may present an overlay on top ofthe television show video the user is viewing. The overlay may includeinformation about the detected activity (e.g., motion was detected)and/or from which device/manufacturer the activity notification wasreceived. In some circumstances, the media guidance application mayautomatically begin recording video captured by the appliance inresponse to detecting the activity. To do so, the media guidanceapplication may tune to or access the virtual channel associated withthe appliance and begin recording the content received over that channelin the same manner as typically done for recording television showsbroadcast by a content source.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may record a firstmedia asset received from a first of the content sources. For example,the user may request that the media guidance application schedule forrecording a television show being broadcast by a given content source ata particular time. When the particular time is reached, the mediaguidance application may automatically begin storing the television showreceived by the content source by accessing the channel associated withthe content source. The media guidance application may receive a userselection of the information received from the first Internet appliance.For example, the media guidance application may receive a user selectionof the cell displaying the name/identity associated with the firstInternet appliance in a grid guide. In response to receiving the userselection, the media guidance application may generate for display anoption to schedule for recording video received, at a designated futuretime, from the first Internet appliance on a local storage device of theuser equipment. For example, the media guidance application may presentoptions for the user to specify conditions for recording video capturedby the first Internet appliance on the DVR used to record the contentfrom the content source. For example, the user may specify that video berecorded if any combination of the following is met: a person isdetected in the video that the appliance is capturing, the appliance isin a given location, a time of day is reached, an activity is detected,a user is detected in the video feed of the camera, an event isdetected, a person is within a threshold distance of another object inthe video feed from the camera or is within a threshold distance fromthe camera.

In response to receiving a user selection of the option to record, themedia guidance application may record video received from the firstInternet appliance when the criteria are met (e.g., at the userspecified-time of day). In response to receiving a user request to viewa directory of recorded content, the media guidance application maygenerate for display a first media listing associated with the firstmedia asset that has been recorded and a recording indicator associatedwith the first Internet appliance indicating that the video from thefirst Internet appliance was recorded. For example, the media guidanceapplication may display a list of all recorded programs and include inthat list an identifier of the video captured by the selected appliance.The identifier may include the manufacturer of the camera and/or any ofthe criteria that caused the media guidance application to record thevideo captured by the camera. For example, the media guidanceapplication may specify a name of a person or type of motion detected bythe camera as the identifier of the video. The user may select theidentifier in the list of recorded content to play back the clip of thevideo captured by the appliance and recorded by the media guidanceapplication.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may perform a seriesof steps to generate the simultaneous display of the second plurality ofmedia asset listings and the first timeline that includes the indicatorsrepresenting activity detected by the first Internet appliance duringthe second time interval. The media guidance application may search adatabase associated with a second Internet appliance to identifyactivity detected by the second Internet appliance during the secondtime interval, wherein the second Internet appliance is associated witha different manufacturer than the first Internet appliance, and whereinthe second Internet appliance is of a different type than the firstInternet appliance. For example, the user may select a RING doorbellfrom a list of detected appliances. In response, the media guidanceapplication may access a RING server and/or the RING doorbell itself toretrieve activity detected by that appliance. For each identifiedactivity, the media guidance application may retrieve, from the databaseassociated with the second Internet appliance, a timepoint representingwhen the identified activity was detected by the second Internetappliance. For example, each detected activity may be assigned a rangeof time during which the activity was detected. In particular, the RINGdoorbell may detect a person in view of the doorbell between 5:34PM-5:45 PM. As such, the RING doorbell may associate with this activitythe timepoint 5:34-5:45 PM.

The media guidance application may generate a second timeline having alength corresponding to the second time interval. For example, if theuser navigates back to the previous time period 5-6 PM, the mediaguidance application may generate a second timeline having a range ofone hour representing activity that was detected by the second appliancebetween 5-6 PM. The media guidance application may add indicators to thesecond timeline at positions corresponding to the retrieved timepointsrepresenting when the respective activity was detected by the secondInternet appliance. For example, the media guidance application may adda first indicator of a first type (e.g., a blue line) for motionactivity that was detected at a particular point (e.g., at 5:15 PM) andmay add a second indicator of a second type (e.g., a red circle) foraudio activity that was detected at a particular point (e.g., at 5:55PM). The media guidance application may generate a simultaneous displayof the second plurality of media asset listings, the first timeline thatincludes the indicators representing activity detected by the firstInternet appliance during the second time interval, and a secondtimeline that includes indicators representing activity detected by asecond Internet appliance during the second time interval.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may navigate acursor to a first indicator that represents a first activity detected bythe first Internet appliance. For example, the user may press arrows ona remote control to navigate a cursor from a program listingrepresenting previously transmitted content by the content source downto an activity indicator (e.g., motion activity detected by a NESTcamera at 5:30 PM). The cursor may visually distinguish the selectedactivity indicator. The media guidance application may receive a userrequest to sequentially present content associated with the activitiesdetected by the first and second Internet appliances starting from apoint in time associated with the first indicator. For example, the usermay select a PLAY button on a remote control while the cursor ispositioned over the first indicator to instruct the media guidanceapplication to generate a playlist of activities detected starting fromthe timepoint of the first indicator (e.g., 5:30 PM) to the current time(e.g., 7 PM) or to the end of the second time period that is displayed(e.g., 6 PM).

The media guidance application may generate for display contentrepresenting the first activity detected by the first Internetappliance. For example, the media guidance application may retrieve alocally stored clip associated with the selected activity or may accessa NEST server and request a clip associated with the selected activitydetected by the NEST camera at 5:30 PM. The media guidance applicationmay determine that a second indicator that represents a second activitydetected by the second Internet appliance is positioned between thefirst indicator and a third indicator that represents a third activitydetected by the first Internet appliance. For example, the mediaguidance application may search all of the selected detected appliancesand the activities represented in the simultaneous display for anyactivity that was detected and represented by a timeline following 5:30PM. The media guidance application may determine that at 5:45 PM theRING doorbell detected an activity that is represented in the timelinein the simultaneous display. Accordingly, following presentation of theclip associated with the NEST camera of activity that was detected at5:30 PM, the media guidance application may access and present a clipassociated with the activity detected by the RING doorbell at 5:45 PM.In this manner, the media guidance application may generate a playlistof clips representing activities in a sequential and chronologicalmanner across all of the detected and selected Internet appliances.

It should be noted that the systems, methods, apparatuses, and/oraspects described above may be applied to, or used in accordance with,other systems, methods, apparatuses, and/or aspects described in thisdisclosure.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The above and other objects and advantages of the disclosure will beapparent upon consideration of the following detailed description, takenin conjunction with the accompanying drawings, in which like referencecharacters refer to like parts throughout, and in which:

FIG. 1 shows an illustrative display screen for integrating Internetappliances in accordance with some embodiments of the disclosure;

FIG. 2 shows an illustrative display screen for displaying activitydetected by an Internet appliance in accordance with some embodiments ofthe disclosure;

FIGS. 3-6 show illustrative display screens for browsing Internetappliances in accordance with some embodiments of the disclosure;

FIG. 7 shows an illustrative display screen for displaying an activitytimeline for an Internet appliance in accordance with some embodimentsof the disclosure;

FIGS. 8 and 9 show illustrative examples of display screens generated bya media guidance application in accordance with some embodiments of thedisclosure;

FIG. 10 is a block diagram of an illustrative user equipment device inaccordance with some embodiments of the disclosure;

FIG. 11 is a block diagram of an illustrative media system in accordancewith some embodiments of the disclosure;

FIGS. 12 and 13 are flowcharts of detailed illustrative processes fordisplaying Internet appliance timelines with content source media assetsin accordance with some embodiments of the disclosure;

FIG. 14 is a flowchart of a detailed illustrative process forintegrating an Internet appliance with a plurality of content sources inaccordance with some embodiments of the disclosure;

FIG. 15 is a flowchart of a detailed illustrative process for displayingInternet appliances based on a manufacturer in accordance with someembodiments of the disclosure;

FIG. 16 is a flowchart of a detailed illustrative process for browsingInternet appliances in accordance with some embodiments of thedisclosure;

FIG. 17 is a flowchart of a detailed illustrative process for recordingcontent from Internet appliances in accordance with some embodiments ofthe disclosure; and

FIG. 18 is a flowchart of a detailed illustrative process for displayingcontent according to activity timelines from Internet appliances inaccordance with some embodiments of the disclosure.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Systems and methods for navigating to an Internet appliance using amedia guidance application are provided. Below is an exemplarydiscussion of the disclosure with video camera appliances, however theteachings below apply in a similar manner to any Internet Protocol (IP)connected appliance. As referred to herein, the term “Internetappliance” should be understood to mean a user device that generates orcaptures content (e.g., video or audio) and makes that contentaccessible via the Internet through an account associated with the user.The content available from the Internet appliances is associatedone-to-one with each user account. Namely, different user accountscannot access the same Internet appliance. In some implementations, thecontent (live or previously captured/stored) is accessible via theInternet by directly accessing a storage device or content capturecircuit of the Internet appliance. In some implementations, the content(live or previously captured/stored) is accessible via the Internet byaccessing a server associated with the Internet appliance and whichcommunicates with the Internet appliance to obtain the content.Particularly, the content may be stored and retrieved directly from theInternet appliance or via a server in communication with the Internetappliance. In some implementations, the server may store the contentcaptured by the Internet appliance and make that content accessible viathe Internet to a user or device. For example, Internet appliances mayinclude cameras, doorbells, lights, motion sensors and any componentthat captures activity and sends the activity over the Internet.

For example, the media guidance application may be implemented on userequipment (e.g., a set-top box). The media guidance application maysearch a user's home network to detect any available Internetappliances. The media guidance application may present a drag-and-dropinterface to allow the user to select which of the detected devices tointegrate with the content sources accessible by the user equipment. Forexample, once selected, the media guidance application may assignvirtual channels to the selected detected Internet appliances and maytreat those appliances as any ordinary content source (e.g., channel).Any functionality typically available for the user to perform with thecontent sources (e.g., television channels) may become available to theuser to perform with the integrated Internet appliances.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may present a gridguide that includes media asset listings for content received from alist of the content sources (e.g., television channels) and informationthat is received from any of the integrated Internet appliances. Forexample, the media guidance application may display grid guides shown inFIGS. 6 and 7. The user may browse through the listings and applianceinformation to view past content. For example, the user may request toview listings of content that was transmitted by the content sources ona previous day. The media guidance application may display, in the gridguide, those listings of the previously transmitted content on theprevious day together with a timeline representing activity detected bythe integrated Internet appliances on the previous day. For example, themedia guidance application may present the grid guide shown in FIG. 7which includes the previously available/transmitted content. The usermay select any of the activities presented in the grid guide of thepreviously transmitted content to view content representing thoseactivities. By unifying the information available from Internetappliances with content source information, the user is provided with aseamless browsing experience of accessing content without having toclose one application (e.g., the media guidance application) to accesscontent from another application (e.g., an app for a selected Internetappliance).

In some embodiments, a first Internet appliance, external to userequipment, may be integrated with a plurality of content sourcesaccessible to the user equipment. For example, the user may select aNEST video camera as the first Internet appliance that is detected inthe home network. The media guidance application may assign a virtualchannel (e.g., channel 102) determined to be available to the selectedNEST video camera and thereby integrate the selected camera with othercontent sources (e.g., channels 1-100). FIG. 1 shows an illustrativedisplay screen 100 for integrating Internet appliances in accordancewith some embodiments of the disclosure.

For example, the media guidance application may detect on a networklocal to the user equipment a plurality of Internet appliances. Forexample, the media guidance application may issue a discovery commandover a local area network. Any Internet appliance that receives thediscovery command may respond with its address and various otherparameters (e.g., device ID, functions, manufacturer, etc.). Inparticular, the media guidance application and each Internet appliancemay implement a UPnP protocol and may be discovered in accordance withthe UPnP protocol. Any other type of protocol may be used. The mediaguidance application may determine a type, identifier, and manufacturerof each of the detected plurality of Internet appliances based on anaddress of each of the detected plurality of Internet appliancesreceived in the response to the discovery command. The media guidanceapplication may generate for display in a first display region 150 alist of detected Internet appliances that includes a first Internetappliance 110 (e.g., a RING doorbell) and a second Internet appliance120 (e.g., a NEST camera). In some implementations, the media guidanceapplication may present a dropdown menu listing each appliance that wasdetected along with the device parameters (e.g., device ID,manufacturer, functions, etc.). The user may provide login informationto the media guidance application for each different manufacturer listedfor each appliance that was detected.

The media guidance application may receive user input that drags firstInternet appliance 110 from first display region 150 to a second displayregion 130. In response to receiving the user input dragging theidentifier of the given appliance from one region of the display to theother, the media guidance application may identify a channel space ofthe user equipment that includes a plurality of content source channelsassociated with the plurality of content sources and a plurality ofvirtual channels associated with Internet appliances. For example, themedia guidance application may access a stored list of channels thatincludes a set of channels provided by the user's cable provider and alist of virtual channels (e.g., channels 100-104) that are unassigned oravailable to use for external appliances. The channels provided by thecable provider allow access to content that is broadcast/cablecast bythe content provider to multiple users at scheduled times. The virtualchannels are channels that provide access to local userdevices/appliances. The media guidance application may search thevirtual channels to identify a first virtual channel that is notcurrently assigned to an Internet appliance. For example, the mediaguidance application may search the virtual channels to determinewhether a stored indication is present for a given virtual channelidentifying an Internet appliance associated with that channel. Themedia guidance application may modify the channel space to associate thefirst virtual channel with the first Internet appliance by associating avirtual channel number, the determined identifier, type, and/ormanufacturer with the first Internet appliance.

In some embodiments, a first video camera associated with a user isselected. The first video camera may be an IP appliance that transmitsvideo content over the Internet. The first video camera may be selectedvia a drag-and-drop interface 100 shown in FIG. 1. Drag-and-dropinterface 100 may be accessed by the user on the Internet by accessing awebsite associated with the media guidance application and/or locallyusing the locally implemented media guidance application on the userequipment. Any selections the user makes on the website may betransmitted to the local user device with instructions on whichappliances to map to which channels and with instructions on accessingthe activity feeds from each appliance.

For example, the media guidance application may present a user with alist of appliances or cameras to which the user has access. The list mayinclude a first video camera 110 from a first vendor (e.g., RING) and asecond camera 120 from a second vendor (e.g., NEST). The media guidanceapplication may receive a user selection of first video camera 110 thatdrags the selected camera to second region 130 and drops the selectedcamera in second region 130. In response to the user dropping the camerain second region 130, the media guidance application may add theselected camera to a list of appliances that are integrated by the mediaguidance application. In some implementations, once a selected applianceis added to second region 130, the media guidance application may assignthe selected appliance identifying information (e.g., icon, name, andtype) and may associate the activity feed from the selected appliancewith a channel number.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may determine thatunique identifiers (e.g., friendly names) for each camera can be managedby either the third-party application (e.g., a first vendor, such asRING), or by the user. For example, the media guidance application mayreceive input from the user to label a camera's unique identifier. Asanother example, the media guidance application may retrieve uniqueidentifier names from the third-party application associated with thecorresponding camera.

The media guidance application may identify a virtual channel numberspace in which the media guidance application may associate IP connectedappliances. The virtual channel space may be provided by the contentprovider. The media guidance application may select a channel numberfrom this space (e.g., based on the next available number or based on avendor associated with a group of numbers) and associate each selectedappliance with a corresponding number. Upon receiving a user selectionof commit option 140, the media guidance application may modify thechannel lineup in the guide to include the appliances listed in secondregion 130. For example, in response to a selection of option 140, themedia guidance application may integrate on the user equipment theselected first video camera with content sources available from acontent provider by adding the selected camera to the virtual channelspace that is available from a content provider of contentprovider-provided channels. For example, the media guidance applicationmay generate a channel lineup that includes a set of content providerchannels on channels 1-5 (e.g., FOX, HBO, NBC, CBS, TBS) and appliancechannels 100-105 (e.g., channel 100 for first video camera, channel 101for a second video camera, etc.).

The list of appliances presented in interface 100 may be generated inseveral ways. For example, as part of a setup, the user may provide alogin or credentials to the media guidance application for everyappliance or manufacturer the user is interested in including. Asreferred to herein, the term “vendor” is used interchangeably with theterm “manufacturer” but both should be understood to have the samemeaning. In response, the media guidance application may log in to everyserver associated with the credentials and receive the activityassociated with the corresponding appliance from the correspondingserver. For example, the user may provide a RING login and a NEST loginto the media guidance application. In response, the media guidanceapplication may access the RING server and the NEST server to retrievethe activity feeds of the various appliances the user has purchased withthese vendors. The media guidance application may be provided withauthentication and handshaking information for passing security tokensbetween the media guidance application and each given appliance the userselects.

In some embodiments, the list of appliances may be automaticallygenerated by the media guidance application in response to detectingvarious appliances on the local network of the user equipment in thehome. For example, the media guidance application may transmit discoverymessages to user devices in the home and each appliance may transmitback identifying information including an IP address and vendorinformation. The media guidance application may use the IP address andvendor information to retrieve an application programming interface(API) associated with each device (e.g., from local storage or a server)to communicate with the corresponding device. The media guidanceapplication may receive the activity information directly from theappliance using the API of the appliance and/or may retrieve theactivity information from a remote server associate with thecorresponding appliance. In some embodiments, an aggregator of all theAPIs of each device may provide access to the media guidance applicationto retrieve the APIs or communicate with the various appliances. Forexample, the media guidance application may communicate with the APIaggregator with identifying information of each appliance the userselects. The API aggregator may then directly communicate with theservers associated with the appliances and/or directly with theappliances. This provides the media guidance application with acentralized server with which to communicate to receive activityinformation from each appliance associated with different vendors.

After the selected appliance or camera is integrated with the contentprovider content sources (e.g., television channels), the media guidanceapplication may receive notifications or activity information from eachappliance. FIG. 2 shows an illustrative display screen 200 fordisplaying activity detected by an Internet appliance in accordance withsome embodiments of the disclosure.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may display video220 from a first content source (e.g., NBC) of the content sources. Forexample, the media guidance application may present video 220 that isbeing broadcast to a plurality of users and is being received on a givenchannel (e.g., NBC). The media guidance application may receive datafrom a Internet appliance (e.g., a RING doorbell) indicating that theInternet appliance detected activity (e.g., motion). For example, theRING doorbell may transmit a notification to the RING server indicatingthat motion was detected. In such circumstances, the media guidanceapplication may periodically poll the RING server to detect suchactivity that was reported to the RING server. Alternatively, the RINGserver may transmit notifications it receives from the RING doorbell tothe media guidance application associated with the user account.Alternatively, the RING doorbell may transmit a notification to themedia guidance application directly indicating that motion was detected(e.g., in accordance with the UPnP protocol). In response to detectingsuch activity, the media guidance application may present a notification210 associated with the Internet appliance (e.g., the RING doorbell)that includes the received data simultaneously with video 220 from thefirst of the content sources. The data may include an image (not shown)of the detected activity and a description of the detected activity. Forexample, the media guidance application may present an overlay on top ofthe television show video 220 the user is viewing. The overlay mayinclude information about the detected activity (e.g., motion wasdetected) and/or from which device/manufacturer (e.g., RING) server theactivity notification was received. In some circumstances, the mediaguidance application may automatically begin recording video captured bythe appliance in response to detecting the activity. To do so, the mediaguidance application may tune to or access the virtual channelassociated with the appliance and begin recording the content receivedover that channel in the same manner as typically done for recordingtelevision shows broadcast by a content source.

For example, the media guidance application may monitor activityinformation on a server associated with each appliance and/or mayreceive activity information directly from the connected appliance. Forexample, a connected video camera may detect a person moving in a room.In response, the connected video camera may transmit a notificationindicating the detection of the person. The notification may include animage or video clip associated with the detected activity. The mediaguidance application may receive the notification of activity andpresent the notification 210 together with video being received fromanother content source. For example, display 200 shows a video 220 beingreceived from a given content source (e.g., a television channel from acontent provider) or video being retrieved from an on-demand source suchas a server or a local/remote storage device. In response to receivingthe notification from a given appliance, the media guidance applicationmay overlay notification 210 on top of the video that the user isviewing. The notification may include information identifying theappliance which detected the activity (e.g., RING vendor doorbell cameraappliance).

Notification 210 may be interactive such that in response to the userselecting the notification (e.g., by pressing a SELECT button on aremote control), the media guidance application may present moreinformation about the notification (e.g., the video clip or image, suchas the last captured image, showing the person moving in the roomcaptured by the doorbell camera or the live feed from the appliance). Insome implementations, in response to the user selecting thenotification, the media guidance application may change channels to thevirtual channel associated with the appliance to display the live feedof activity received from the appliance. Once the live feed of theappliance is presented, the user may perform trick play operations. Forexample, the media guidance application may receive a rewind commandfrom the user and in response the media guidance application may accessa previous position within the video feed received from the appliance.The previous position may be accessed from a local storage device (e.g.,the DVR), from the appliance itself, and/or from a server associatedwith the appliance.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may transmitinformation to a selected appliance. For example, the user may select avoice option on the remote control or via an on-screen displayed option.The user may speak and the media guidance application may transmit thespeech to the appliance the user is accessing. For example, the user mayspeak to someone at the door by speaking into the voice remote of themedia guidance application. In some embodiments, the media guidanceapplication may transmit the speech received from the user to all or asubset of appliances (e.g., in accordance with the UPnP protocol). Forexample, the media guidance application may identify a set of appliancesassociated with a characteristic (e.g., video cameras that are in agiven location) and may send the voice command simultaneously for outputby each of those video cameras. If a light appliance is determined to bein the selected appliances, the media guidance application may excludesending the voice command to that appliance.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may enable a user tonavigate using the media guidance application through the integratedselected first video camera and content sources. FIGS. 3-6 showillustrative display screens for browsing Internet appliances inaccordance with some embodiments of the disclosure. For example, themedia guidance application may receive a user request to browse channels(e.g., by pressing the up arrow on a remote control) or view a guide.FIG. 3 shows a display 300 of video from a content source beingpresented. While a user is viewing the video from the content source(e.g., a television channel from a content provider), the user may pressthe up arrow to browse other content sources. In response, the mediaguidance application may present a browse bar 310 that includes aplurality of content sources from other channels including appliances onvirtual channels. In particular, the media guidance application maypresent icons associated with each appliance in an order determined bythe channel number associated with each appliance. As the user navigatesthe browse bar left/right, higher number/lower number content sourcesmay be presented. For example, if the cursor is positioned over channel100 associated with the Front Door appliance and the user presses theleft arrow, the cursor may highlight channel 99, which is the previouschannel, which may be a television channel providing live content fromthe content source (e.g., HBO).

In some implementations, the Internet appliance may be a user's Internetvideo camera. For example, the first Internet appliance may be a NESTcamera the user installed in their living room. The NEST camera may be acamera that continuously captures video and uploads the captured videoto a NEST server for storage for a predetermined period of time (e.g.,10 days or longer based on a subscription). Access to the NEST camerafeed is available to the user by logging in to the NEST app or websiteand selecting the designated camera (e.g., living room camera). In suchimplementations, the media guidance application may present, togetherwith video received from a first of the content sources, a browse regionin which content information is presented for a second of the contentsources associated with a current channel number. For example, the mediaguidance application may present video that is being broadcast to aplurality of users and is being received on a given channel (e.g., NBC).The media guidance application may present a navigable region (e.g., asan overlay) together with the video that is being broadcast that allowsthe user to view information for other channels (e.g., other contentsource channels or other virtual channels).

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may receive userinput to navigate to a subsequent content source in a list of contentsources, wherein the subsequent content source is associated with achannel number that is higher or lower in a sequence of channels. Forexample, the media guidance application may present information (e.g.,scheduling information including title and broadcast times of mediaassets) for channel 99 (e.g., a content source channel, FOX). The mediaguidance application may receive a user input to navigate to a higherchannel (e.g., channel 100). The media guidance application maydetermine that the next higher channel (e.g., channel 100) is a virtualchannel that is associated with an Internet appliance (e.g., RINGcamera). The media guidance application, in response, may present in thebrowse region information associated with the Internet appliance and/orlive video being received by the Internet appliance. For example, themedia guidance application may present identifier, type, and/ormanufacturer of the first Internet appliance and a live video feed beingcaptured by the Internet appliance (e.g., in a window inside the browseregion).

In some implementations, instead of or in addition to icons, the mediaguidance application may present activity information including contentfrom each appliance in the browse bar. For example, FIG. 4 shows adisplay of the browse bar 420 with live video 430 being received fromthe appliance with additional activity information provided by theappliance. In particular, the live video 430 representation may be animage captured by the appliance and a description of the activity (e.g.,motion event). Higher number channels (e.g., channel 200) are displayedto the right of the live video 430 and may correspond to contentprovided by the content source (e.g., television channels). In someimplementations, the browse bar 420 may be presented in a display thatincludes the video from the content provider in a picture-in-guidewindow 410.

In some implementations, the media guidance application may receive auser request to perform a trick play operation on the live videopresented in the browse region. In response to receiving the userrequest, the media guidance application retrieves stored videoassociated with the first Internet appliance that includes videocaptured by the first Internet appliance at a time in the past. Forexample, the media guidance application may determine the manufacturerassociated with the Internet appliance (e.g., RING doorbell) displayedin the browse region. The media guidance application may access storeduser credentials associated with the manufacturer (e.g., RINGmanufacturer credentials). The media guidance application may access theInternet appliance (directly or via the server associated with the firstInternet appliance) using the stored user credentials. For example, themedia guidance application may communicate with the RING serverassociated with the RING doorbell to provide the user's credentials andrequest a stored video feed of video captured by the RING doorbell. Thestored video feed may be based on how far back the user rewinds thevideo shown in the browse region. In some implementations, the videofeed from the first Internet appliance may be stored (periodically orcontinuously) on the user equipment on which the media guidanceapplication is implemented (e.g., the DVR or set-top box). In suchcircumstances, in response to receiving the user request to perform thetrick play operation on the video shown in the browse region, the mediaguidance application may retrieve and display in the browse region thestored video from the local storage device corresponding to the userrequested position.

In some embodiments, the browse bar may be arranged according to thevendor associated with each appliance. FIG. 5 shows an illustrativedisplay screen 500 for browsing Internet appliances in accordance withsome embodiments of the disclosure. In some embodiments, the mediaguidance application may receive a user selection of an option to view alist of integrated Internet appliances. For example, the media guidanceapplication may receive a user selection of the MENU button on a remotecontrol or a selection of a SHOW APPLIANCES button on a remote control.In response to receiving the selection, the media guidance applicationmay determine a manufacturer of each integrated Internet appliance inthe list. For example, the media guidance application may access a listof previously detected appliances on the local network. The mediaguidance application may retrieve from the list the stored manufacturerof each appliance (e.g., RING and NEST). The media guidance applicationmay generate a first set of integrated Internet appliances (e.g., NESTcamera 1, NEST camera 2, NEST doorbell) associated with a firstmanufacturer (e.g., NEST) and a second set of integrated Internetappliances (e.g., RING camera 1, RING doorbell) associated with a secondmanufacturer (e.g., RING). For example, the media guidance applicationmay identify all the detected appliances having the same firstmanufacturer (e.g., NEST) and generate a first set of Internetappliances associated with NEST (e.g., NEST camera 1, NEST camera 2,NEST doorbell, etc.). The media guidance application may identify allthe detected appliances having the same second manufacturer (e.g., RING)and generate a first set of Internet appliances associated with RING(e.g., RING camera 1, RING doorbell, etc.).

The media guidance application may generate for display a plurality ofrows, wherein a first of the plurality of rows 510 is associated withthe first manufacturer (e.g., RING), and where a second of the pluralityof rows 520 is associated with the second manufacturer (e.g., NEST). Themedia guidance application may generate for display, in the first row, afirst plurality of cells 512, 514, and 516 each representingcontent/video captured and associated with each of the first set ofintegrated Internet appliances and generate for display, in the secondrow, a second plurality of cells 522, 524, and 526 each representingcontent/video captured and associated with each of the second set ofintegrated Internet appliances. For example, in a row for the NESTmanufacturer, the media guidance application may present three cells512, 514, and 516, one for each detected appliance associated with theNEST manufacturer (e.g., a cell for NEST camera 1, a cell for NESTcamera 2, and a cell for NEST doorbell). For example, in a row for theRING manufacturer, the media guidance application may present two cells522 and 524, one for each detected appliance associated with the RINGmanufacturer (e.g., a cell for RING camera 1, and a cell for RINGdoorbell). In each cell, the media guidance application may include anyone of the following: live video captured by the correspondingappliance, information associated with the appliance, and/or an activitytimeline of recent activity detected by the given appliance. Theactivity timeline may be the same as the activity timeline discussedbelow in connection with FIG. 7.

In particular, the media guidance application may group the video/imagefeeds of each of the cameras into a single row of icons or cellsassociated with the RING vendor and present those in vendor-specificbrowse bar 510. In response to the user pressing a down arrow, the mediaguidance application may present a single row of icons associated with adifferent vendor (e.g., Nest). The user may navigate to each icon in therow by pressing the right/left arrow keys. In response to the userpressing the SELECT button when a given icon or cell is highlighted, themedia guidance application may present the activity received from theparticular appliance in full screen (e.g., video is received from theparticular appliance and presented in full screen). The video oractivity may be received directly from the appliance and/or over theInternet from the vendor server associated with the selected appliance.For example, if a Nest camera is selected in the browse bar, the mediaguidance application may communicate with the Nest server to receive thevideo from the Nest server associated with the selected camera. In someimplementations, the media guidance application may continuously receivethe video from each camera directly and/or via the Internet from thecorresponding server and present the video immediately when the userrequests access via the browse bar or when the user changes channels toa channel associated with the given appliance (e.g., if the user selectschannel 100 on the remote control). In some embodiments, cells 512, 514,516, 522, 524 and 526 may only display images associated with thecorresponding appliances or live video being captured, but one of thecells (e.g., cell 512) that is currently highlighted by the cursor mayprovide additional information (e.g., a description of the appliance orevent being captured or a timeline associated with the appliance). Whenthe user presses a down arrow while highlighting cell 522, the mediaguidance application may navigate the display to present additionalmanufacturers if more are available. When the user presses the rightarrow when highlighting the last cell 516, the media guidanceapplication may present information corresponding to additionalappliances from the corresponding manufacturer.

In some embodiments, when the user has navigated to an iconcorresponding to a camera, the video feed of the camera may be displayedin the icon. The media guidance application may determine that any trickplay bar inputs (e.g., play, pause, stop, rewind, fast forward, etc.)may control the live video feed of the camera. For example, when theuser navigates to an icon corresponding to a camera showing a live videofeed, the media guidance application may pause playback of the livevideo feed in response to receiving a user input from a remote controlcorresponding to a “pause” input.

In some embodiments, when the icons are displayed on screencorresponding to each camera, the icon may display a picture, where thepicture is an image corresponding to the product (e.g., an icon for aNest camera may display the Nest logo).

In some embodiments, the user may share a live video feed with a seconduser. The user may input a command on the remote or the application togenerate a link to send to the second user. The second user may accessthe link to access the live video on a user device (e.g., a smartphone,tablet, etc.). For example, the user may share the live video feed witha second user (e.g., someone the user is on the phone with) so that thesecond user can access the live video stream on the second user'scomputer (e.g., to remotely “housesit” for the user while the user is onvacation).

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may present a gridguide that includes content provider channels and virtual channels ofthe selected appliances. FIG. 6 shows an illustrative display screen 600for browsing Internet appliances in accordance with some embodiments ofthe disclosure. The media guidance application may generate asimultaneous display of a first plurality of media asset listings 610,corresponding to a first plurality of media assets transmitted by eachof the plurality of content sources (e.g., FOX, CBS, ABC) during a firsttime interval (e.g., 8 PM-10 PM) that includes the present time (e.g.,8:15 PM), and information received from the Internet appliances 620. Forexample, the user may select an option to view a set of listings for thecurrent time (e.g., by pressing a GUIDE button on a remote control). Inresponse, the media guidance application may present a grid guide thatincludes listings for a plurality of content sources (e.g., channels1-99) and that includes information for the selected Internet appliances(e.g., RING doorbell, RING floodlight, NEST living room camera, the ARLObaby room camera, etc.). The listings may represent content transmittedby the plurality of sources in the present time (e.g., today at 8 PM-10PM). The information for the selected Internet appliances may includecurrent activity or lack thereof detected by the appliance, type ofappliance, location information and/or video received from the Internetappliance.

The grid guide may be sorted by channel number such that if the virtualchannels are higher in order numbers than the content provider channelsthey are displayed at the bottom. Along the content source axis, thechannel numbers and names are provided for the content provider channelsand the vendor provider is displayed for each appliance. Along the timeaxis, titles of programs being scheduled for transmission from thecontent sources are presented for content provider channels 610 andnames of the appliances (e.g., video camera, doorbell, etc.) areprovided for the virtual channels 620. The user can navigate the gridguide using a cursor, and when the user positions the cursor on a givenappliance name listed for a given virtual channel, the media guidanceapplication provides the user with several options.

In some embodiments, in response to receiving a user selection of aSELECT button on a remote control, the media guidance application maypresent in full screen or in the picture-in-guide window 630 the livefeed received from the appliance. In some embodiments, the user mayselect an INFO button on a remote control while a cursor is positionedover a given appliance in display 600. In response, the media guidanceapplication may provide the user with an option to start recording afeed from the appliance or subscribe to a series recording of the feedfrom the appliance. For example, in response to the user selecting theoption to start recording, the media guidance application may storecontinuously on a local storage device or on a cloud storage device theactivity information or video feed received from the selected appliance.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may record a firstmedia asset received from a first of the content sources. For example,the user may request that the media guidance application schedule forrecording a television show being broadcast by a given content source ata particular time. When the particular time is reached, the mediaguidance application may automatically begin storing the television showreceived by the content source by accessing the channel associated withthe content source. The media guidance application may receive a userselection of the information received from the Internet appliance. Forexample, the media guidance application may receive a user selection ofthe cell 622 displaying the name/identity associated with the Internetappliance (e.g., RING front door camera) in a grid guide. In response toreceiving the user selection, the media guidance application maygenerate for display an option to schedule for recording video received,at a designated future time, from the first Internet appliance on alocal storage device of the user equipment. For example, the mediaguidance application may present options for the user to specifyconditions for recording video captured by the first Internet applianceon the DVR used to record the content from the content source. Forexample, the user may specify that video be recorded if any combinationof the following is met: a person is detected in the video that theappliance is capturing, the appliance is in a given location, a time ofday is reached, an activity is detected, a user is detected in the videofeed of the camera, an event is detected, a person is within a thresholddistance of another object in the video feed from the camera or iswithin a threshold distance from the camera.

In response to receiving a user selection of the option to record, themedia guidance application may record video received from the firstInternet appliance when the criteria are met (e.g., at theuser-specified time of day). The user may select the option to subscribeto a series recording and may specify criteria for recording contentfrom the given appliance. The criteria may include an event name, anactivity type, and/or time/location. When the criteria are met, themedia guidance application may locally record or remotely store thevideo or activity information from the selected appliance. For example,the user may specify that the criteria are movement or sound detectedand as a result whenever the media guidance application receives anotification that the appliance detects movement or sound, the mediaguidance application may start recording the video feed on theparticular virtual channel for a specified period of time (e.g.,threshold time period or until the movement ends). For example, the usermay specify that the criteria are an event and as a result whenever themedia guidance application receives a notification that the appliance iscapturing an event (e.g., when a friend provides a live feed of aconcert), the media guidance application may start recording the videofeed on the particular virtual channel for a specified period of time.For example, the user may specify that the criteria are a time/locationand as a result whenever the media guidance application determines theappliance is at the location at the specified time, the media guidanceapplication may start recording the video feed on the particular virtualchannel for a specified period of time. For example, the user mayspecify that the criteria are a predicted event of interest and as aresult whenever the media guidance application determines the applianceis capturing an event that is of interest to the user (e.g., a soccergame that a user's son is playing in), the media guidance applicationmay start recording the video feed on the particular virtual channel forthe length of the predicted event.

In response to receiving a user request to view a directory of recordedcontent, the media guidance application may generate for display a firstmedia listing associated with the first media asset that has beenrecorded and a recording indicator associated with the Internetappliance (e.g., RING front door camera) indicating that the video fromthe Internet appliance was recorded. For example, the media guidanceapplication may display a list of all recorded programs and include inthat list an identifier of the video captured by the selected appliance.The identifier may include the manufacturer of the camera and/or any ofthe criteria that caused the media guidance application to record thevideo captured by the camera. For example, the media guidanceapplication may specify a name of a person or type of motion detected bythe camera as the identifier of the video. The user may select theidentifier in the list of recorded content to play back the clip of thevideo captured by the appliance and recorded by the media guidanceapplication.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may allow the userto navigate to previous time periods to view previously transmittedmedia assets and previous activity detected by the selected appliances.FIG. 7 shows an illustrative display screen 700 for displaying anactivity timeline for an Internet appliance in accordance with someembodiments of the disclosure. The media guidance application mayreceive a user request to navigate to a second time interval thatincludes a period of time that precedes the present time (e.g., 10 PM).For example, the user may navigate a cursor in screen 500 to the left toreach an earlier time period (e.g., today at 8-9:30 PM) that precedesthe current time (e.g., today at 10 PM). The media guidance applicationmay in response to receiving the user request to navigate to theprevious time period (e.g., today at 8-9:30 PM), generate a simultaneousdisplay of a second plurality of media asset listings 730, correspondingto a second plurality of media assets that were transmitted by each ofthe plurality of content sources during the second time interval, and afirst timeline 742 that includes indicators 710 representing activitydetected by the first Internet appliance (e.g., RING camera) during thesecond time interval (e.g., today at 8-9:30 PM). For example, the mediaguidance application may update the display to present listings ofcontent transmitted earlier today between 8-9:30 PM by the plurality ofsources. The media guidance application may display together with thesepast listings, timeline 742 representing activity detected by theselected Internet appliance. For example, the media guidance applicationmay receive indications of motion/sounds detected by the RING videocamera along with timepoints at which the motion/sounds were detected(e.g., 7:45 PM, 8:32 PM). The media guidance application may identifywhich of the motion/sounds were detected at the selected previous timeof 8-9:30 PM. The media guidance application may present a timeline withindicators at each point between 8-9:30 PM at which the motion/soundswere detected as the information in the grid row for the selectedInternet appliance. The indicators may differ depending on the type ofactivity they represent (e.g., red indicators may identify motion andblue indicators may identify sounds).

In some embodiments, in order to generate the timeline of activitydetected by the first Internet appliance, the media guidance applicationmay search a database associated with the first Internet appliance toidentify activity detected by the first Internet appliance during thesecond time interval. For example, the media guidance application maytransmit a request to a server associated with the selected Internetappliance. The request may identify the second time interval and requestactivity information (including any video clips) that was detectedduring the second time interval. For example, the media guidanceapplication may contact the RING server to obtain information about theRING video camera that was selected as the first Internet appliance. Themedia guidance application may provide login credentials of the userassociated with the RING video camera. The RING server may search itsdatabase for the requested content and return to the media guidanceapplication the requested activity information. The media guidanceapplication may assemble this information into a timeline including theappropriate indicators of activity. In some implementations, the mediaguidance application may contact the RING video camera directly over thelocal network to obtain the information about the activity detectedduring the second time interval. The media guidance application mayassemble this information received directly from the RING video camerainto first timeline 742 including the appropriate indicators ofactivity.

The media guidance application may search a database associated with asecond Internet appliance (e.g., NEST camera) to identify activitydetected by the second Internet appliance during the second timeinterval. The second Internet appliance is associated with a differentmanufacturer than the first Internet appliance. For example, the secondappliance manufacturer may be NEST and the first appliance manufacturermay be RING. The second Internet appliance may be a different type thanthe first Internet appliance. For example, the second appliance may be acamera while the first appliance may be a doorbell. The user may selecta NEST camera from a list of detected appliances. In response, the mediaguidance application may access a NEST server and/or the NEST cameraitself to retrieve activity detected by that appliance. For eachidentified activity, the media guidance application may retrieve, fromthe database associated with the second Internet appliance, a timepointrepresenting when the identified activity was detected by the secondInternet appliance. For example, each detected activity may be assigneda range of time during which the activity was detected. In particular,the NEST camera may detect a person in view of the camera at 8:05 PM,8:15 PM, 8:29 PM, 9:15 PM and 9:25 PM. As such, the NEST camera mayassociate with this activity the timepoints 8:05 PM, 8:15 PM, 8:29 PM,9:15 PM and 9:25 PM.

The media guidance application may generate a second timeline 744 havinga length corresponding to the second time interval (7 PM-9:30 PM). Forexample, if the user navigates back to the previous time period 7PM-9:30 PM, the media guidance application may generates second timeline744 having a range of 2.5 hours representing activity that was detectedby the second appliance between 7 PM-9:30 PM. The media guidanceapplication may add indicators 720 to the second timeline at positions8:05 PM, 8:15 PM, 8:29 PM, 9:15 PM and 9:25 PM corresponding to theretrieved timepoints representing when the respective activity wasdetected by the second Internet appliance. For example, the mediaguidance application may add a first indicator of a first type (e.g., ablue line) for motion activity that was detected at a particular point(e.g., at 8:05 PM) and may add a second indicator of a second type(e.g., a red circle) for audio activity that was detected at aparticular point (e.g., at 9:25 PM). The media guidance application maygenerate a simultaneous display of the second plurality of media assetlistings 730, first timeline 742 that includes the indicators 710representing activity detected by the first Internet appliance (e.g.,RING doorbell) during the second time interval, and second timeline 744that includes indicators 720 representing activity detected by secondInternet appliance (e.g., NEST camera) during the second time interval(7-9:30 PM).

FIG. 7 shows a display 700 of previous time periods to which the usernavigated. For example, the current time may be 10 PM and the mediaguidance application may have received a user input to navigate toprevious time periods (e.g., the time period from 8 PM-9:30 PM). Display700 may include a list of titles that represent programs each of thecontent provider sources (e.g., FOX, CBS, ABC) previously provided atthe scheduled transmission time (e.g., “Gotham” at 8 PM and “Scorpion”at 9 PM). The user may navigate a cursor to any of these programs andthe user may select the title to access the corresponding previouslytransmitted program. The programs may be accessed from an on-demandserver or local storage if they were recorded at the previouslyscheduled time period. In some embodiments, for each of the Internetappliances (e.g., RING camera or Nest camera), the media guidanceapplication may present activity markers 710 and 720 at thecorresponding timepoints at which activity was detected. For example, ifthe RING camera detected motion at 7:49 PM, the RING camera may providethis indication of activity including the time, length of activity, andtype of activity (e.g., motion) to the media guidance application. Themedia guidance application may present marker 710 at the time position7:49 PM to inform the user about the previously detected activity in therow corresponding to the RING camera appliance. For example, if the Nestcamera detected sound at 8:15 PM, the Nest camera may provide thisindication of activity including the time, length of activity, and typeof activity (e.g., sound) to the media guidance application. The mediaguidance application may present marker 720 at the time position 8:15 PMto inform the user about the previously detected activity in the rowcorresponding to the Nest camera appliance. In some embodiments, marker710 and 720 may be visually distinguished based on the type of activitythe marker represents. In particular, marker 710 may be in the colorblue to represent motion detected and marker 720 may be in the colorgreen to represent sound detected.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may assign channelsto user-chosen subscriptions. For example, in response to the userselecting to subscribe to a content source (e.g., such as Facebook Live,Amazon, Periscope, etc.), the media guidance application may assign achannel to the subscription. In some embodiments, the channels may bepreset on the media guidance application and user equipment. The mediaguidance application may receive a notification, generated by detectingupcoming content on the channel associated with the subscription, for anevent on the channel (e.g., the user receives an overlay notificationalerting the user that an MLB baseball game will be streaming on the“Facebook” channel at 7:00 pm). The media guidance application maysubscribe to subsets of content available from a content source (e.g.,individual users on Facebook, individual sports, etc.). The mediaguidance application may retrieve content from the content source basedon user-specified areas of interest (e.g., only record “Facebook Live”streams from specific individual users about sports) to stream on thechannel associated with the subscription. The media guidance applicationmay record the content streams in local or remote storage. The mediaguidance application may allow the user to access the recorded contentstreams to watch previously recorded live content.

In some embodiments, the user may navigate a cursor to the markers 710and 720 to view content associated with the previously detectedactivity. For example, the user may highlight marker 710 and press aSELECT button on a remote control. In response, the media guidanceapplication may retrieve previously recorded content of the activityrepresented by marker 710. In particular, the media guidance applicationmay retrieve a video clip stored on the RING server during theparticular previous time period of 7:40-8 PM. Alternatively, the mediaguidance application may retrieve a video clip stored on a local storagedevice in the user equipment during the particular previous time periodof 7:40-8 PM. The video clip may have been automatically recorded by themedia guidance application in response to receiving detection ofactivity from the corresponding appliance by accessing the video feedfrom the camera directly or from the server associated with the camera.In some embodiments, the clips may be presented in full screen or in apicture-in-guide window 750 while continuing to show the listings ofcontent and activity of the previous time period. In some embodiments,the activity timeline of each appliance may be retrieved from the serverassociated with each appliance based on the API associated with theappliance. For example, the media guidance application may identify theprevious time period to which the user navigated in the grid to theservers associated with each appliance and request the timeline ofactivity that was detected by each appliance during the time period forpresentation in the grid.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may receive a userrequest to play highlights of the appliances from the previous timeperiods. In some embodiments, the media guidance application maynavigate a cursor to a first indicator that represents a first activitydetected by the first Internet appliance. For example, the user maypress arrows on a remote control to navigate a cursor from a programlisting representing previously transmitted content (e.g., 2 “BrokeGirls”) by the content source (e.g., CBS) down to an activity indicator710 (e.g., motion activity detected by a RING doorbell camera at 7:49PM). The cursor may visually distinguish the selected activity indicator710. The media guidance application may receive a user request tosequentially present content associated with the activities detected bythe first and second Internet appliances starting from a point in timeassociated with the first indicator. For example, the user may select aPLAY button on a remote control while the cursor is positioned overfirst indicator 710 to instruct the media guidance application togenerate a playlist of activities detected starting from the timepointof the first indicator 710 (e.g., 7:49 PM) to the current time (e.g., 10PM) or to the end of the second time period that is displayed (e.g.,9:30 PM).

The media guidance application may generate for display content or clipsrepresenting the first activity detected by the first Internet appliance(e.g., RING doorbell). For example, the media guidance application mayretrieve a locally stored clip associated with the selected activity ormay access a RING server and request a clip associated with the selectedactivity detected by the RING doorbell at 7:49 PM. The media guidanceapplication may determine that a second indicator 712 that represents asecond activity detected by the second Internet appliance (e.g., NESTcamera) is positioned between the first indicator 710 and a thirdindicator 714 that represents a third activity detected by the firstInternet appliance. For example, the media guidance application maysearch all of the selected detected appliances across all of theassigned virtual channels 740 and the activities represented in thesimultaneous display for any activity that was detected and representedby a timeline following 7:49 PM. The media guidance application maydetermine that at 8:05 PM the NEST camera detected an activity that isrepresented in timeline 744 in the simultaneous display. Accordingly,following presentation of the clip associated with the RING doorbell ofactivity that was detected at 7:49 PM, the media guidance applicationmay access and present a clip associated with the activity detected bythe NEST camera at 8:05 PM. In this manner, the media guidanceapplication may generate a playlist of clips representing activities ina sequential and chronological manner across all of the detected andselected Internet appliances. In some embodiments, the clips may besequentially presented in window 750 or in full screen.

In response, the media guidance application may access a video clip fromeach of the appliances during each of the previous time periods whereactivity was detected and may play each video clip in accordance withthe time period during which the activity was detected. In particular,the media guidance application may first retrieve a clip from the RINGcamera associated with the time period 7:40-7:49; after that clip ends,the media guidance application may retrieve a second clip automaticallyfrom the Nest camera associated with the time period 8-8:15 PM. Afterthat clip ends, the media guidance application may identify an activitythat was detected sequentially after 8:15 PM (e.g., a clip from anotherRING camera of activity detected between 8:45-9 PM). The media guidanceapplication may automatically play the next video clip from the thirdcamera (e.g., the another RING camera). The media guidance applicationmay continue playing back each clip from each appliance in accordancewith when the activity was detected until the last previously detectedactivity is reached.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may present contentor activity (e.g., a live video feed) of each of a selected set ofcameras in a split screen manner. For example, a video feed from a RINGcamera may be presented in a left half of a display screen (e.g., a leftwindow) and video feed from a Nest camera may be presented in a righthalf of the display screen (e.g., a right window). Audio may be outputfrom each camera based on which window the user highlights. For example,if the user navigates a cursor to the right window, the audio from theNest camera may be output.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may present activityfrom one appliance in a larger area of a screen than activity fromanother appliance based on the activity being detected by the applianceand/or based on the type of appliance. For example, in the split screenembodiment, the media guidance application may present the RING camerain the left window which may be larger in size than the Nest cameradisplayed in the right window. Particularly, the media guidanceapplication may be configured to always present content from the RINGcamera in a larger size than content from the Nest camera. In someimplementations, the media guidance application may be configured todetect where each appliance is located and select the window size basedon the location of the appliance. For example, if the appliance islocated in the front door and capturing content from the front door, themedia guidance application may output video from that camera in a largerwindow than a camera capturing content in a particular bedroom. In someimplementations, the media guidance application may be configured todetect the activity being captured by each appliance and select thewindow size based on the activity detected by the appliance. Forexample, if the appliance is capturing motion of an unknown person(e.g., a stranger at the front door), the media guidance application mayoutput video from that camera in a larger window than a camera capturingmotion of a baby in a particular bedroom. In some embodiments, the videoor content from a particular appliance may be presented in apicture-in-picture window with live content being received from acontent source of the content provider (e.g., a television channel). Thesize of the picture-in-picture window may be selected in a similarmanner to those above (e.g., based on activity type, camera type, and/orcamera location).

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may receive verbalinput from the user requesting that activity from a particular camera bepresented. For example, the media guidance application may receiveverbal input “Show me the front door” and the media guidance applicationmay search descriptions of each appliance to identify the word “frontdoor”. In response, the media guidance application may retrieve theactivity or video content being captured by the RING front door cameraand present the video to the user.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may receive a userselection of a person shown in the content or activity received from agiven appliance. For example, the video footage from the RING front doorcamera may capture a stranger. The user may select the stranger in thefootage shown to the user and in response the media guidance applicationmay store a facial profile of the selected stranger. The media guidanceapplication may monitor video footage of the stranger across all of theselected appliances (e.g., the RING door camera, the Nest bedroomcamera, and the RING living room camera). In response to detecting thefacial profile in any of the cameras, the media guidance application mayrecord a segment in which the stranger appears. The media guidanceapplication may present to the user a sequence of clips featuring theselected stranger in order of the times associated with the clips atwhich the activity of the stranger was detected.

In some embodiments, in response to detecting a person having theselected facial profile or in response to detecting a person that doesnot match any previously set friendly facial profiles, the mediaguidance application may start recording footage received from theappliance that detected the person. The media guidance application mayautomatically present the footage in a PIP window together with othercontent from another content source (e.g., a television channel). Insome embodiments, the media guidance application may detect that theuser equipment is in stand-by mode and not presenting any content. Inresponse to detecting the person, the media guidance application mayautomatically turn on the user equipment by taking it out of stand-bymode and present the footage received from the appliance that detectedthe person. In some implementations, the media guidance application mayonly take the user equipment out of stand-by mode if the activity orperson is detected at a particular time of day (e.g., at night). Forexample, if the person is detected during the daytime hours, the mediaguidance application may simply record the footage of the person forlater presentation to the user and not turn on the user equipment. Forexample, if the person is detected during the nighttime hours, the mediaguidance application may immediately present the live footage of theperson being captured by the appliance for immediate presentation to theuser and by turning on the user equipment. In some embodiments, themedia guidance application may consider the location and distance of thedetected person to other objects in determining whether to present thefootage live or to record the footage. For example, if the person isdetected 100 yards away from the home, the media guidance applicationmay record the footage being captured, but if the person is within 10feet of the home or a user's personal property (e.g., a car of theuser), the media guidance application may immediately present the livefootage. In some embodiments, the media guidance application may recordthe footage of activity that was detected instead of or in addition topresenting the footage to the user if the user is currently viewingother content from another content source or another appliance, to avoiddisrupting the user.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application may detect an objectpresent in the live footage via object detection. The media guidanceapplication may compare the object to a database of known objects todetermine the type of object present in the live footage. In response todetermining the type of object, the media guidance application maydetermine a level of threat based on the type of detected object. Forexample, the media guidance application may determine a level of threat(e.g., low, medium, high) based on characteristics of the detectedobject. The media guidance application may determine that a detectedobject, such as a gun, has a high level of threat because itscharacteristics (e.g., deadly, unsafe, etc.) indicate that it'sdangerous. The media guidance application may determine that a detectedobject, such as a delivered package, has a low level of threat becauseits characteristics (e.g., Amazon package, matches tracking informationof a package the user ordered, etc.) indicate that it's safe andexpected by the user. The media guidance application may determine andperform an action in response to the threat based on the determinedlevel of threat. For example, the media guidance application maydetermine to perform an action by retrieving, from a database, an actioncorresponding to a level of threat. For example, for high levels ofthreat (e.g., the detected object is a gun), the media guidanceapplication may determine, from the database, that the appropriateaction in response is to alert the authorities. As another example, forlow levels of threat (e.g., the detected object is a delivered package),the media guidance application may determine, from the database, thatthe appropriate action is to alert the user with a notification (e.g.,may send the user a screenshot of the delivered package from the livefeed).

The amount of content available to users in any given content deliverysystem can be substantial. Consequently, many users desire a form ofmedia guidance through an interface that allows users to efficientlynavigate content selections and easily identify content that they maydesire. An application that provides such guidance is referred to hereinas an interactive media guidance application or, sometimes, a mediaguidance application or a guidance application.

Interactive media guidance applications may take various forms dependingon the content for which they provide guidance. One typical type ofmedia guidance application is an interactive television program guide.Interactive television program guides (sometimes referred to aselectronic program guides) are well-known guidance applications that,among other things, allow users to navigate among and locate many typesof content or media assets. Interactive media guidance applications maygenerate graphical user interface screens that enable a user to navigateamong, locate and select content. As referred to herein, the terms“media asset” and “content” should be understood to mean anelectronically consumable user asset, such as television programming, aswell as pay-per-view programs, on-demand programs (as in video-on-demand(VOD) systems), Internet content (e.g., streaming content, downloadablecontent, Webcasts, etc.), video clips, audio, content information,pictures, rotating images, documents, playlists, websites, articles,books, electronic books, blogs, chat sessions, social media,applications, games, and/or any other media or multimedia and/orcombination of the same. Guidance applications also allow users tonavigate among and locate content. As referred to herein, the term“multimedia” should be understood to mean content that utilizes at leasttwo different content forms described above, for example, text, audio,images, video, or interactivity content forms. Content may be recorded,played, displayed or accessed by user equipment devices, but can also bepart of a live performance.

The media guidance application and/or any instructions for performingany of the embodiments discussed herein may be encoded on computerreadable media. Computer readable media includes any media capable ofstoring data. The computer readable media may be transitory, including,but not limited to, propagating electrical or electromagnetic signals,or may be non-transitory including, but not limited to, volatile andnon-volatile computer memory or storage devices such as a hard disk,floppy disk, USB drive, DVD, CD, media cards, register memory, processorcaches, Random Access Memory (“RAM”), etc.

With the advent of the Internet, mobile computing, and high-speedwireless networks, users are accessing media on user equipment deviceson which they traditionally did not. As referred to herein, the phrase“user equipment device,” “user equipment,” “user device,” “electronicdevice,” “electronic equipment,” “media equipment device,” or “mediadevice” should be understood to mean any device for accessing thecontent described above, such as a television, a Smart TV, a set-topbox, an integrated receiver decoder (IRD) for handling satellitetelevision, a digital storage device, a digital media receiver (DMR), adigital media adapter (DMA), a streaming media device, a DVD player, aDVD recorder, a connected DVD, a local media server, a BLU-RAY player, aBLU-RAY recorder, a personal computer (PC), a laptop computer, a tabletcomputer, a WebTV box, a personal computer television (PC/TV), a PCmedia server, a PC media center, a hand-held computer, a stationarytelephone, a personal digital assistant (PDA), a mobile telephone, aportable video player, a portable music player, a portable gamingmachine, a smart phone, or any other television equipment, computingequipment, or wireless device, and/or combination of the same. In someembodiments, the user equipment device may have a front facing screenand a rear facing screen, multiple front screens, or multiple angledscreens. In some embodiments, the user equipment device may have a frontfacing camera and/or a rear facing camera. On these user equipmentdevices, users may be able to navigate among and locate the same contentavailable through a television. Consequently, media guidance may beavailable on these devices, as well. The guidance provided may be forcontent available only through a television, for content available onlythrough one or more of other types of user equipment devices, or forcontent available both through a television and one or more of the othertypes of user equipment devices. The media guidance applications may beprovided as on-line applications (i.e., provided on a web-site), or asstand-alone applications or clients on user equipment devices. Variousdevices and platforms that may implement media guidance applications aredescribed in more detail below.

One of the functions of the media guidance application is to providemedia guidance data to users. As referred to herein, the phrase “mediaguidance data” or “guidance data” should be understood to mean any datarelated to content or data used in operating the guidance application.For example, the guidance data may include program information, guidanceapplication settings, user preferences, user profile information, medialistings, media-related information (e.g., broadcast times, broadcastchannels, titles, descriptions, ratings information (e.g., parentalcontrol ratings, critic's ratings, etc.), genre or category information,actor information, logo data for broadcasters' or providers' logos,etc.), media format (e.g., standard definition, high definition, 3D,etc.), on-demand information, blogs, websites, and any other type ofguidance data that is helpful for a user to navigate among and locatedesired content selections.

FIGS. 8-9 show illustrative display screens that may be used to providemedia guidance data. The display screens shown in FIGS. 8-9 may beimplemented on any suitable user equipment device or platform. While thedisplays of FIGS. 8-9 are illustrated as full screen displays, they mayalso be fully or partially overlaid over content being displayed. A usermay indicate a desire to access content information by selecting aselectable option provided in a display screen (e.g., a menu option, alistings option, an icon, a hyperlink, etc.) or pressing a dedicatedbutton (e.g., a GUIDE button) on a remote control or other user inputinterface or device. In response to the user's indication, the mediaguidance application may provide a display screen with media guidancedata organized in one of several ways, such as by time and channel in agrid, by time, by channel, by source, by content type, by category(e.g., movies, sports, news, children, or other categories ofprogramming), or other predefined, user-defined, or other organizationcriteria.

FIG. 8 shows illustrative grid of a program listings display 800arranged by time and channel that also enables access to different typesof content in a single display. The program listings in display 800represent content available to the user from the subscribed contentsource bundle (e.g., first content source bundle 110). After the contentsource bundle is modified by the media guidance application, a differentset of program listings may be provided representing programs availablefrom the revised list of content sources in the modified bundle. Display800 may include grid 802 with: (1) a column of channel/content typeidentifiers 804, where each channel/content type identifier (which is acell in the column) identifies a different channel or content typeavailable; and (2) a row of time identifiers 806, where each timeidentifier (which is a cell in the row) identifies a time block ofprogramming. Grid 802 also includes cells of program listings, such asprogram listing 808, where each listing provides the title of theprogram provided on the listing's associated channel and time. With auser input device, a user can select program listings by movinghighlight region 810. Information relating to the program listingselected by highlight region 810 may be provided in program informationregion 812. Region 812 may include, for example, the program title, theprogram description, the time the program is provided (if applicable),the channel the program is on (if applicable), the program's rating, andother desired information.

In addition to providing access to linear programming (e.g., contentthat is scheduled to be transmitted to a plurality of user equipmentdevices at a predetermined time and is provided according to aschedule), the media guidance application also provides access tonon-linear programming (e.g., content accessible to a user equipmentdevice at any time and is not provided according to a schedule).Non-linear programming may include content from different contentsources including on-demand content (e.g., VOD), Internet content (e.g.,streaming media, downloadable media, etc.), locally stored content(e.g., content stored on any user equipment device described above orother storage device), or other time-independent content. On-demandcontent may include movies or any other content provided by a particularcontent provider (e.g., HBO On Demand providing “The Sopranos” and “CurbYour Enthusiasm”). HBO ON DEMAND is a service mark owned by Time WarnerCompany L.P. et al. and THE SOPRANOS and CURB YOUR ENTHUSIASM aretrademarks owned by the Home Box Office, Inc. Internet content mayinclude web events, such as a chat session or Webcast, or contentavailable on-demand as streaming content or downloadable content throughan Internet web site or other Internet access (e.g. FTP).

Grid 802 may provide media guidance data for non-linear programmingincluding on-demand listing 814, recorded content listing 816, andInternet content listing 818. A display combining media guidance datafor content from different types of content sources is sometimesreferred to as a “mixed-media” display. Various permutations of thetypes of media guidance data that may be displayed that are differentthan display 800 may be based on user selection or guidance applicationdefinition (e.g., a display of only recorded and broadcast listings,only on-demand and broadcast listings, etc.). As illustrated, listings814, 816, and 818 are shown as spanning the entire time block displayedin grid 802 to indicate that selection of these listings may provideaccess to a display dedicated to on-demand listings, recorded listings,or Internet listings, respectively. In some embodiments, listings forthese content types may be included directly in grid 802. Additionalmedia guidance data may be displayed in response to the user selectingone of the navigational icons 820. (Pressing an arrow key on a userinput device may affect the display in a similar manner as selectingnavigational icons 820.)

Display 800 may also include video region 822, and options region 826.Video region 822 may allow the user to view and/or preview programs thatare currently available, will be available, or were available to theuser. The content of video region 822 may correspond to, or beindependent from, one of the listings displayed in grid 802. Griddisplays including a video region are sometimes referred to aspicture-in-guide (PIG) displays. PIG displays and their functionalitiesare described in greater detail in Satterfield et al. U.S. Pat. No.6,564,378, issued May 13, 2003 and Yuen et al. U.S. Pat. No. 6,239,794,issued May 29, 2001, which are hereby incorporated by reference hereinin their entireties. PIG displays may be included in other mediaguidance application display screens of the embodiments describedherein.

Options region 826 may allow the user to access different types ofcontent, media guidance application displays, and/or media guidanceapplication features. Options region 826 may be part of display 800 (andother display screens described herein), or may be invoked by a user byselecting an on-screen option or pressing a dedicated or assignablebutton on a user input device. The selectable options within optionsregion 826 may concern features related to program listings in grid 802or may include options available from a main menu display. Featuresrelated to program listings may include searching for other air times orways of receiving a program, recording a program, enabling seriesrecording of a program, setting program and/or channel as a favorite,purchasing a program, or other features. Options available from a mainmenu display may include search options, VOD options, parental controloptions, Internet options, cloud-based options, device synchronizationoptions, second screen device options, options to access various typesof media guidance data displays, options to subscribe to a premiumservice, options to edit a user's profile, options to access a browseoverlay, or other options.

The media guidance application may be personalized based on a user'spreferences. A personalized media guidance application allows a user tocustomize displays and features to create a personalized “experience”with the media guidance application. This personalized experience may becreated by allowing a user to input these customizations and/or by themedia guidance application monitoring user activity to determine varioususer preferences. Users may access their personalized guidanceapplication by logging in or otherwise identifying themselves to theguidance application. Customization of the media guidance applicationmay be made in accordance with a user profile. The customizations mayinclude varying presentation schemes (e.g., color scheme of displays,font size of text, etc.), aspects of content listings displayed (e.g.,only HDTV or only 3D programming, user-specified broadcast channelsbased on favorite channel selections, re-ordering the display ofchannels, recommended content, etc.), desired recording features (e.g.,recording or series recordings for particular users, recording quality,etc.), parental control settings, customized presentation of Internetcontent (e.g., presentation of social media content, e-mail,electronically delivered articles, etc.) and other desiredcustomizations.

The media guidance application may allow a user to provide user profileinformation or may automatically compile user profile information. Themedia guidance application may, for example, monitor the content theuser accesses and/or other interactions the user may have with theguidance application. Additionally, the media guidance application mayobtain all or part of other user profiles that are related to aparticular user (e.g., from other web sites on the Internet the useraccesses, such as www.Tivo.com, from other media guidance applicationsthe user accesses, from other interactive applications the useraccesses, from another user equipment device of the user, etc.), and/orobtain information about the user from other sources that the mediaguidance application may access. As a result, a user can be providedwith a unified guidance application experience across the user'sdifferent user equipment devices. This type of user experience isdescribed in greater detail below in connection with FIG. 11. Additionalpersonalized media guidance application features are described ingreater detail in Ellis et al., U.S. Patent Application Publication No.2005/0251827, filed Jul. 11, 2005, Boyer et al., U.S. Pat. No.7,165,098, issued Jan. 16, 2007, and Ellis et al., U.S. PatentApplication Publication No. 2002/0174430, filed Feb. 21, 2002, which arehereby incorporated by reference herein in their entireties.

Another display arrangement for providing media guidance is shown inFIG. 9. Video mosaic display 900 includes selectable options 902 forcontent information organized based on content type, genre, and/or otherorganization criteria. In display 900, television listings option 904 isselected, thus providing listings 906, 908, 910, and 912 as broadcastprogram listings. In display 900 the listings may provide graphicalimages including cover art, still images from the content, video clippreviews, live video from the content, or other types of content thatindicate to a user the content being described by the media guidancedata in the listing. Each of the graphical listings may also beaccompanied by text to provide further information about the contentassociated with the listing. For example, listing 908 may include morethan one portion, including media portion 914 and text portion 916.Media portion 914 and/or text portion 916 may be selectable to viewcontent in full-screen or to view information related to the contentdisplayed in media portion 914 (e.g., to view listings for the channelthat the video is displayed on).

The listings in display 900 are of different sizes (i.e., listing 906 islarger than listings 908, 910, and 912), but if desired, all thelistings may be the same size. Listings may be of different sizes orgraphically accentuated to indicate degrees of interest to the user orto emphasize certain content, as desired by the content provider orbased on user preferences. Various systems and methods for graphicallyaccentuating content listings are discussed in, for example, Yates, U.S.Patent Application Publication No. 2010/0153885, filed Nov. 12, 2009,which is hereby incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.

Users may access content and the media guidance application (and itsdisplay screens described above and below) from one or more of theiruser equipment devices. FIG. 10 shows a generalized embodiment ofillustrative user equipment device 1000. More specific implementationsof user equipment devices are discussed below in connection with FIG.11. User equipment device 1000 may receive content and data viainput/output (hereinafter “I/O”) path 1002. I/O path 1002 may providecontent (e.g., broadcast programming, on-demand programming, Internetcontent, content available over a local area network (LAN) or wide areanetwork (WAN), and/or other content) and data to control circuitry 1004,which includes processing circuitry 1006 and storage 1008. Controlcircuitry 1004 may be used to send and receive commands, requests, andother suitable data using I/O path 1002. I/O path 1002 may connectcontrol circuitry 1004 (and specifically processing circuitry 1006) toone or more communications paths (described below). I/O functions may beprovided by one or more of these communications paths, but are shown asa single path in FIG. 10 to avoid overcomplicating the drawing.

Control circuitry 1004 may be based on any suitable processing circuitrysuch as processing circuitry 1006. As referred to herein, processingcircuitry should be understood to mean circuitry based on one or moremicroprocessors, microcontrollers, digital signal processors,programmable logic devices, field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs),application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs), etc., and may includea multi-core processor (e.g., dual-core, quad-core, hexa-core, or anysuitable number of cores) or supercomputer. In some embodiments,processing circuitry may be distributed across multiple separateprocessors or processing units, for example, multiple of the same typeof processing units (e.g., two Intel Core i7 processors) or multipledifferent processors (e.g., an Intel Core i5 processor and an Intel Corei7 processor). In some embodiments, control circuitry 1004 executesinstructions for a media guidance application stored in memory (i.e.,storage 1008). Specifically, control circuitry 1004 may be instructed bythe media guidance application to perform the functions discussed aboveand below. For example, the media guidance application may provideinstructions to control circuitry 1004 to generate the media guidancedisplays. In some implementations, any action performed by controlcircuitry 1004 may be based on instructions received from the mediaguidance application.

In client-server based embodiments, control circuitry 1004 may includecommunications circuitry suitable for communicating with a guidanceapplication server or other networks or servers. The instructions forcarrying out the above mentioned functionality may be stored on theguidance application server. Communications circuitry may include acable modem, an integrated services digital network (ISDN) modem, adigital subscriber line (DSL) modem, a telephone modem, Ethernet card,or a wireless modem for communications with other equipment, or anyother suitable communications circuitry. Such communications may involvethe Internet or any other suitable communications networks or paths(which is described in more detail in connection with FIG. 11). Inaddition, communications circuitry may include circuitry that enablespeer-to-peer communication of user equipment devices, or communicationof user equipment devices in locations remote from each other (describedin more detail below).

Memory may be an electronic storage device provided as storage 1008 thatis part of control circuitry 1004. As referred to herein, the phrase“electronic storage device” or “storage device” should be understood tomean any device for storing electronic data, computer software, orfirmware, such as random-access memory, read-only memory, hard drives,optical drives, digital video disc (DVD) recorders, compact disc (CD)recorders, BLU-RAY disc (BD) recorders, BLU-RAY 3D disc recorders,digital video recorders (DVR, sometimes called a personal videorecorder, or PVR), solid state devices, quantum storage devices, gamingconsoles, gaming media, or any other suitable fixed or removable storagedevices, and/or any combination of the same. Storage 1008 may be used tostore various types of content described herein as well as mediaguidance data described above. Nonvolatile memory may also be used(e.g., to launch a boot-up routine and other instructions). Cloud-basedstorage, described in relation to FIG. 11, may be used to supplementstorage 1008 or instead of storage 1008.

Control circuitry 1004 may include video generating circuitry and tuningcircuitry, such as one or more analog tuners, one or more MPEG-2decoders or other digital decoding circuitry, high-definition tuners, orany other suitable tuning or video circuits or combinations of suchcircuits. Encoding circuitry (e.g., for converting over-the-air, analog,or digital signals to MPEG signals for storage) may also be provided.Control circuitry 1004 may also include scaler circuitry forupconverting and downconverting content into the preferred output formatof the user equipment 1000. Circuitry 1004 may also includedigital-to-analog converter circuitry and analog-to-digital convertercircuitry for converting between digital and analog signals. The tuningand encoding circuitry may be used by the user equipment device toreceive and to display, to play, or to record content. The tuning andencoding circuitry may also be used to receive guidance data. Thecircuitry described herein, including for example, the tuning, videogenerating, encoding, decoding, encrypting, decrypting, scaler, andanalog/digital circuitry, may be implemented using software running onone or more general purpose or specialized processors. Multiple tunersmay be provided to handle simultaneous tuning functions (e.g., watch andrecord functions, picture-in-picture (PIP) functions, multiple-tunerrecording, etc.). If storage 1008 is provided as a separate device fromuser equipment 1000, the tuning and encoding circuitry (includingmultiple tuners) may be associated with storage 1008.

A user may send instructions to control circuitry 1004 using user inputinterface 1010. User input interface 1010 may be any suitable userinterface, such as a remote control, mouse, trackball, keypad, keyboard,touch screen, touchpad, stylus input, joystick, voice recognitioninterface, or other user input interfaces. Display 1012 may be providedas a stand-alone device or integrated with other elements of userequipment device 1000. For example, display 1012 may be a touchscreen ortouch-sensitive display. In such circumstances, user input interface1010 may be integrated with or combined with display 1012. Display 1012may be one or more of a monitor, a television, a liquid crystal display(LCD) for a mobile device, amorphous silicon display, low temperaturepoly silicon display, electronic ink display, electrophoretic display,active matrix display, electro-wetting display, electrofluidic display,cathode ray tube display, light-emitting diode display,electroluminescent display, plasma display panel, high-performanceaddressing display, thin-film transistor display, organic light-emittingdiode display, surface-conduction electron-emitter display (SED), lasertelevision, carbon nanotubes, quantum dot display, interferometricmodulator display, or any other suitable equipment for displaying visualimages. In some embodiments, display 1012 may be HDTV-capable. In someembodiments, display 1012 may be a 3D display, and the interactive mediaguidance application and any suitable content may be displayed in 3D. Avideo card or graphics card may generate the output to the display 1012.The video card may offer various functions such as accelerated renderingof 3D scenes and 2D graphics, MPEG-2/MPEG-4 decoding, TV output, or theability to connect multiple monitors. The video card may be anyprocessing circuitry described above in relation to control circuitry1004. The video card may be integrated with the control circuitry 1004.Speakers 1014 may be provided as integrated with other elements of userequipment device 1000 or may be stand-alone units. The audio componentof videos and other content displayed on display 1012 may be playedthrough speakers 1014. In some embodiments, the audio may be distributedto a receiver (not shown), which processes and outputs the audio viaspeakers 1014.

The guidance application may be implemented using any suitablearchitecture. For example, it may be a stand-alone applicationwholly-implemented on user equipment device 1000. In such an approach,instructions of the application are stored locally (e.g., in storage1008), and data for use by the application is downloaded on a periodicbasis (e.g., from an out-of-band feed, from an Internet resource, orusing another suitable approach). Control circuitry 1004 may retrieveinstructions of the application from storage 1008 and process theinstructions to generate any of the displays discussed herein. Based onthe processed instructions, control circuitry 1004 may determine whataction to perform when input is received from input interface 1010. Forexample, movement of a cursor on a display up/down may be indicated bythe processed instructions when input interface 1010 indicates that anup/down button was selected.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application is a client-serverbased application. Data for use by a thick or thin client implemented onuser equipment device 1000 is retrieved on-demand by issuing requests toa server remote to the user equipment device 1000. In one example of aclient-server based guidance application, control circuitry 1004 runs aweb browser that interprets web pages provided by a remote server. Forexample, the remote server may store the instructions for theapplication in a storage device. The remote server may process thestored instructions using circuitry (e.g., control circuitry 1004) andgenerate the displays discussed above and below. The client device mayreceive the displays generated by the remote server and may display thecontent of the displays locally on equipment device 1000. This way, theprocessing of the instructions is performed remotely by the server whilethe resulting displays are provided locally on equipment device 1000.Equipment device 1000 may receive inputs from the user via inputinterface 1010 and transmit those inputs to the remote server forprocessing and generating the corresponding displays. For example,equipment device 1000 may transmit a communication to the remote serverindicating that an up/down button was selected via input interface 1010.The remote server may process instructions in accordance with that inputand generate a display of the application corresponding to the input(e.g., a display that moves a cursor up/down). The generated display isthen transmitted to equipment device 1000 for presentation to the user.

In some embodiments, the media guidance application is downloaded andinterpreted or otherwise run by an interpreter or virtual machine (runby control circuitry 1004). In some embodiments, the guidanceapplication may be encoded in the ETV Binary Interchange Format (EBIF),received by control circuitry 1004 as part of a suitable feed, andinterpreted by a user agent running on control circuitry 1004. Forexample, the guidance application may be an EBIF application. In someembodiments, the guidance application may be defined by a series ofJAVA-based files that are received and run by a local virtual machine orother suitable middleware executed by control circuitry 1004. In some ofsuch embodiments (e.g., those employing MPEG-2 or other digital mediaencoding schemes), the guidance application may be, for example, encodedand transmitted in an MPEG-2 object carousel with the MPEG audio andvideo packets of a program.

User equipment device 1000 of FIG. 10 can be implemented in system 1100of FIG. 11 as user television equipment 1102, user computer equipment1104, wireless user communications device 1106, or any other type ofuser equipment suitable for accessing content, such as a non-portablegaming machine. For simplicity, these devices may be referred to hereincollectively as user equipment or user equipment devices, and may besubstantially similar to user equipment devices described above. Userequipment devices, on which a media guidance application may beimplemented, may function as a standalone device or may be part of anetwork of devices. Various network configurations of devices may beimplemented and are discussed in more detail below.

A user equipment device utilizing at least some of the system featuresdescribed above in connection with FIG. 10 may not be classified solelyas user television equipment 1102, user computer equipment 1104, or awireless user communications device 1106. For example, user televisionequipment 1102 may, like some user computer equipment 1104, beInternet-enabled allowing for access to Internet content, while usercomputer equipment 1104 may, like some television equipment 1102,include a tuner allowing for access to television programming. The mediaguidance application may have the same layout on various different typesof user equipment or may be tailored to the display capabilities of theuser equipment. For example, on user computer equipment 1104, theguidance application may be provided as a web site accessed by a webbrowser. In another example, the guidance application may be scaled downfor wireless user communications devices 1106.

In system 1100, there is typically more than one of each type of userequipment device but only one of each is shown in FIG. 11 to avoidovercomplicating the drawing. In addition, each user may utilize morethan one type of user equipment device and also more than one of eachtype of user equipment device.

In some embodiments, a user equipment device (e.g., user televisionequipment 1102, user computer equipment 1104, wireless usercommunications device 1106) may be referred to as a “second screendevice.” For example, a second screen device may supplement contentpresented on a first user equipment device. The content presented on thesecond screen device may be any suitable content that supplements thecontent presented on the first device. In some embodiments, the secondscreen device provides an interface for adjusting settings and displaypreferences of the first device. In some embodiments, the second screendevice is configured for interacting with other second screen devices orfor interacting with a social network. The second screen device can belocated in the same room as the first device, a different room from thefirst device but in the same house or building, or in a differentbuilding from the first device.

The user may also set various settings to maintain consistent mediaguidance application settings across in-home devices and remote devices.Settings include those described herein, as well as channel and programfavorites, programming preferences that the guidance applicationutilizes to make programming recommendations, display preferences, andother desirable guidance settings. For example, if a user sets a channelas a favorite on, for example, the web site www.Tivo.com on theirpersonal computer at their office, the same channel would appear as afavorite on the user's in-home devices (e.g., user television equipmentand user computer equipment) as well as the user's mobile devices, ifdesired. Therefore, changes made on one user equipment device can changethe guidance experience on another user equipment device, regardless ofwhether they are the same or a different type of user equipment device.In addition, the changes made may be based on settings input by a user,as well as user activity monitored by the guidance application.

The user equipment devices may be coupled to communications network1114. Namely, user television equipment 1102, user computer equipment1104, and wireless user communications device 1106 are coupled tocommunications network 1114 via communications paths 1108, 1110, and1112, respectively. Communications network 1114 may be one or morenetworks including the Internet, a mobile phone network, mobile voice ordata network (e.g., a 4G or LTE network), cable network, public switchedtelephone network, or other types of communications network orcombinations of communications networks. Paths 1108, 1110, and 1112 mayseparately or together include one or more communications paths, suchas, a satellite path, a fiber-optic path, a cable path, a path thatsupports Internet communications (e.g., IPTV), free-space connections(e.g., for broadcast or other wireless signals), or any other suitablewired or wireless communications path or combination of such paths. Path1112 is drawn with dotted lines to indicate that in the exemplaryembodiment shown in FIG. 11 it is a wireless path and paths 1108 and1110 are drawn as solid lines to indicate they are wired paths (althoughthese paths may be wireless paths, if desired). Communications with theuser equipment devices may be provided by one or more of thesecommunications paths, but are shown as a single path in FIG. 11 to avoidovercomplicating the drawing.

Although communications paths are not drawn between user equipmentdevices, these devices may communicate directly with each other viacommunication paths, such as those described above in connection withpaths 1108, 1110, and 1112, as well as other short-range point-to-pointcommunication paths, such as USB cables, IEEE 1394 cables, wirelesspaths (e.g., Bluetooth, infrared, IEEE 802-11x, etc.), or othershort-range communication via wired or wireless paths. BLUETOOTH is acertification mark owned by Bluetooth SIG, INC. The user equipmentdevices may also communicate with each other directly through anindirect path via communications network 1114.

System 1100 includes content source 1116 and media guidance data source1118 coupled to communications network 1114 via communication paths 1120and 1122, respectively. Paths 1120 and 1122 may include any of thecommunication paths described above in connection with paths 1108, 1110,and 1112. Communications with the content source 1116 and media guidancedata source 1118 may be exchanged over one or more communications paths,but are shown as a single path in FIG. 11 to avoid overcomplicating thedrawing. In addition, there may be more than one of each of contentsource 1116 and media guidance data source 1118, but only one of each isshown in FIG. 11 to avoid overcomplicating the drawing. (The differenttypes of each of these sources are discussed below.) If desired, contentsource 1116 and media guidance data source 1118 may be integrated as onesource device. Although communications between sources 1116 and 1118with user equipment devices 1102, 1104, and 1106 are shown as throughcommunications network 1114, in some embodiments, sources 1116 and 1118may communicate directly with user equipment devices 1102, 1104, and1106 via communication paths (not shown) such as those described abovein connection with paths 1108, 1110, and 1112.

System 1100 may also include an advertisement source 1124 coupled tocommunications network 1114 via a communications path 1126. Path 1126may include any of the communication paths described above in connectionwith paths 1108, 1110, and 1112. Advertisement source 1124 may includeadvertisement logic to determine which advertisements to transmit tospecific users and under which circumstances. For example, a cableoperator may have the right to insert advertisements during specifictime slots on specific channels. Thus, advertisement source 1124 maytransmit advertisements to users during those time slots. As anotherexample, advertisement source may target advertisements based on thedemographics of users known to view a particular show (e.g., teenagersviewing a reality show). As yet another example, advertisement sourcemay provide different advertisements depending on the location of theuser equipment viewing a media asset (e.g., east coast or west coast).

In some embodiments, advertisement source 1124 may be configured tomaintain user information including advertisement-suitability scoresassociated with user in order to provide targeted advertising.Additionally or alternatively, a server associated with advertisementsource 1124 may be configured to store raw information that may be usedto derive advertisement-suitability scores. In some embodiments,advertisement source 1124 may transmit a request to another device forthe raw information and calculate the advertisement-suitability scores.Advertisement source 1124 may update advertisement-suitability scoresfor specific users (e.g., first subset, second subset, or third subsetof users) and transmit an advertisement of the target product toappropriate users.

Content source 1116 may include one or more types of contentdistribution equipment including a television distribution facility,cable system headend, satellite distribution facility, programmingsources (e.g., television broadcasters, such as NBC, ABC, HBO, etc.),intermediate distribution facilities and/or servers, Internet providers,on-demand media servers, and other content providers. NBC is a trademarkowned by the National Broadcasting Company, Inc., ABC is a trademarkowned by the American Broadcasting Company, Inc., and HBO is a trademarkowned by the Home Box Office, Inc. Content source 1116 may be theoriginator of content (e.g., a television broadcaster, a Webcastprovider, etc.) or may not be the originator of content (e.g., anon-demand content provider, an Internet provider of content of broadcastprograms for downloading, etc.). Content source 1116 may include cablesources, satellite providers, on-demand providers, Internet providers,over-the-top content providers, or other providers of content. Contentsource 1116 may also include a remote media server used to storedifferent types of content (including video content selected by a user),in a location remote from any of the user equipment devices. Systems andmethods for remote storage of content, and providing remotely storedcontent to user equipment are discussed in greater detail in connectionwith Ellis et al., U.S. Pat. No. 7,761,892, issued Jul. 20, 2010, whichis hereby incorporated by reference herein in its entirety. Contentsource 1116 may be a source that transmits content to a plurality ofusers according to a given schedule. Content source 1116 may makeavailable the same content to any user who is a subscriber to thecontent source. Namely, each user who is a subscriber may be providedwith a different user account but may access the same content fromcontent source 1116.

Media guidance data source 1118 may provide media guidance data, such asthe media guidance data described above. Media guidance data may beprovided to the user equipment devices using any suitable approach. Insome embodiments, the guidance application may be a stand-aloneinteractive television program guide that receives program guide datavia a data feed (e.g., a continuous feed or trickle feed). Programschedule data and other guidance data may be provided to the userequipment on a television channel sideband, using an in-band digitalsignal, using an out-of-band digital signal, or by any other suitabledata transmission technique. Program schedule data and other mediaguidance data may be provided to user equipment on multiple analog ordigital television channels.

In some embodiments, guidance data from media guidance data source 1118may be provided to users' equipment using a client-server approach. Forexample, a user equipment device may pull media guidance data from aserver, or a server may push media guidance data to a user equipmentdevice. In some embodiments, a guidance application client residing onthe user's equipment may initiate sessions with source 1118 to obtainguidance data when needed, e.g., when the guidance data is out of dateor when the user equipment device receives a request from the user toreceive data. Media guidance may be provided to the user equipment withany suitable frequency (e.g., continuously, daily, a user-specifiedperiod of time, a system-specified period of time, in response to arequest from user equipment, etc.). Media guidance data source 1118 mayprovide user equipment devices 1102, 1104, and 1106 the media guidanceapplication itself or software updates for the media guidanceapplication.

In some embodiments, the media guidance data may include viewer data.For example, the viewer data may include current and/or historical useractivity information (e.g., what content the user typically watches,what times of day the user watches content, whether the user interactswith a social network, at what times the user interacts with a socialnetwork to post information, what types of content the user typicallywatches (e.g., pay TV or free TV), mood, brain activity information,etc.). The media guidance data may also include subscription data. Forexample, the subscription data may identify to which sources or servicesa given user subscribes and/or to which sources or services the givenuser has previously subscribed but later terminated access (e.g.,whether the user subscribes to premium channels, whether the user hasadded a premium level of services, whether the user has increasedInternet speed). In some embodiments, the viewer data and/or thesubscription data may identify patterns of a given user for a period ofmore than one year. The media guidance data may include a model (e.g., asurvivor model) used for generating a score that indicates a likelihooda given user will terminate access to a service/source. For example, themedia guidance application may process the viewer data with thesubscription data using the model to generate a value or score thatindicates a likelihood of whether the given user will terminate accessto a particular service or source. In particular, a higher score mayindicate a higher level of confidence that the user will terminateaccess to a particular service or source. Based on the score, the mediaguidance application may generate promotions that entice the user tokeep the particular service or source indicated by the score as one towhich the user will likely terminate access.

Media guidance applications may be, for example, stand-aloneapplications implemented on user equipment devices. For example, themedia guidance application may be implemented as software or a set ofexecutable instructions which may be stored in storage 1008, andexecuted by control circuitry 1004 of a user equipment device 1000. Insome embodiments, media guidance applications may be client-serverapplications where only a client application resides on the userequipment device, and server application resides on a remote server. Forexample, media guidance applications may be implemented partially as aclient application on control circuitry 1004 of user equipment device1000 and partially on a remote server as a server application (e.g.,media guidance data source 1118) running on control circuitry of theremote server. When executed by control circuitry of the remote server(such as media guidance data source 1118), the media guidanceapplication may instruct the control circuitry to generate the guidanceapplication displays and transmit the generated displays to the userequipment devices. The server application may instruct the controlcircuitry of the media guidance data source 1118 to transmit data forstorage on the user equipment. The client application may instructcontrol circuitry of the receiving user equipment to generate theguidance application displays.

Content and/or media guidance data delivered to user equipment devices1102, 1104, and 1106 may be over-the-top (OTT) content. OTT contentdelivery allows Internet-enabled user devices, including any userequipment device described above, to receive content that is transferredover the Internet, including any content described above, in addition tocontent received over cable or satellite connections. OTT content isdelivered via an Internet connection provided by an Internet serviceprovider (ISP), but a third party distributes the content. The ISP maynot be responsible for the viewing abilities, copyrights, orredistribution of the content, and may only transfer IP packets providedby the OTT content provider. Examples of OTT content providers includeYOUTUBE, NETFLIX, and HULU, which provide audio and video via IPpackets. Youtube is a trademark owned by Google Inc., Netflix is atrademark owned by Netflix Inc., and Hulu is a trademark owned by Hulu,LLC. OTT content providers may additionally or alternatively providemedia guidance data described above. In addition to content and/or mediaguidance data, providers of OTT content can distribute media guidanceapplications (e.g., web-based applications or cloud-based applications),or the content can be displayed by media guidance applications stored onthe user equipment device.

Media guidance system 1100 is intended to illustrate a number ofapproaches, or network configurations, by which user equipment devicesand sources of content and guidance data may communicate with each otherfor the purpose of accessing content and providing media guidance. Theembodiments described herein may be applied in any one or a subset ofthese approaches, or in a system employing other approaches fordelivering content and providing media guidance. The following fourapproaches provide specific illustrations of the generalized example ofFIG. 11.

In one approach, user equipment devices may communicate with each otherwithin a home network. User equipment devices can communicate with eachother directly via short-range point-to-point communication schemesdescribed above, via indirect paths through a hub or other similardevice provided on a home network, or via communications network 1114.Each of the multiple individuals in a single home may operate differentuser equipment devices on the home network. As a result, it may bedesirable for various media guidance information or settings to becommunicated between the different user equipment devices. For example,it may be desirable for users to maintain consistent media guidanceapplication settings on different user equipment devices within a homenetwork, as described in greater detail in Ellis et al., U.S. PatentPublication No. 2005/0251827, filed Jul. 11, 2005. Different types ofuser equipment devices in a home network may also communicate with eachother to transmit content. For example, a user may transmit content fromuser computer equipment to a portable video player or portable musicplayer.

In a second approach, users may have multiple types of user equipment bywhich they access content and obtain media guidance. For example, someusers may have home networks that are accessed by in-home and mobiledevices. Users may control in-home devices via a media guidanceapplication implemented on a remote device. For example, users mayaccess an online media guidance application on a website via a personalcomputer at their office, or a mobile device such as a PDA orweb-enabled mobile telephone. The user may set various settings (e.g.,recordings, reminders, or other settings) on the online guidanceapplication to control the user's in-home equipment. The online guidemay control the user's equipment directly, or by communicating with amedia guidance application on the user's in-home equipment. Varioussystems and methods for user equipment devices communicating, where theuser equipment devices are in locations remote from each other, isdiscussed in, for example, Ellis et al., U.S. Pat. No. 8,046,801, issuedOct. 25, 2011, which is hereby incorporated by reference herein in itsentirety.

In a third approach, users of user equipment devices inside and outsidea home can use their media guidance application to communicate directlywith content source 1116 to access content. Specifically, within a home,users of user television equipment 1102 and user computer equipment 1104may access the media guidance application to navigate among and locatedesirable content. Users may also access the media guidance applicationoutside of the home using wireless user communications devices 1106 tonavigate among and locate desirable content.

In a fourth approach, user equipment devices may operate in a cloudcomputing environment to access cloud services. In a cloud computingenvironment, various types of computing services for content sharing,storage or distribution (e.g., video sharing sites or social networkingsites) are provided by a collection of network-accessible computing andstorage resources, referred to as “the cloud.” For example, the cloudcan include a collection of server computing devices, which may belocated centrally or at distributed locations, that provide cloud-basedservices to various types of users and devices connected via a networksuch as the Internet via communications network 1114. These cloudresources may include one or more content sources 1116 and one or moremedia guidance data sources 1118. In addition or in the alternative, theremote computing sites may include other user equipment devices, such asuser television equipment 1102, user computer equipment 1104, andwireless user communications device 1106. For example, the other userequipment devices may provide access to a stored copy of a video or astreamed video. In such embodiments, user equipment devices may operatein a peer-to-peer manner without communicating with a central server.

The cloud provides access to services, such as content storage, contentsharing, or social networking services, among other examples, as well asaccess to any content described above, for user equipment devices.Services can be provided in the cloud through cloud computing serviceproviders, or through other providers of online services. For example,the cloud-based services can include a content storage service, acontent sharing site, a social networking site, or other services viawhich user-sourced content is distributed for viewing by others onconnected devices. These cloud-based services may allow a user equipmentdevice to store content to the cloud and to receive content from thecloud rather than storing content locally and accessing locally-storedcontent.

A user may use various content capture devices, such as camcorders,digital cameras with video mode, audio recorders, mobile phones, andhandheld computing devices, to record content. The user can uploadcontent to a content storage service on the cloud either directly, forexample, from user computer equipment 1104 or wireless usercommunications device 1106 having content capture feature.Alternatively, the user can first transfer the content to a userequipment device, such as user computer equipment 1104. The userequipment device storing the content uploads the content to the cloudusing a data transmission service on communications network 1114. Insome embodiments, the user equipment device itself is a cloud resource,and other user equipment devices can access the content directly fromthe user equipment device on which the user stored the content.

Cloud resources may be accessed by a user equipment device using, forexample, a web browser, a media guidance application, a desktopapplication, a mobile application, and/or any combination of accessapplications of the same. The user equipment device may be a cloudclient that relies on cloud computing for application delivery, or theuser equipment device may have some functionality without access tocloud resources. For example, some applications running on the userequipment device may be cloud applications, i.e., applications deliveredas a service over the Internet, while other applications may be storedand run on the user equipment device. In some embodiments, a user devicemay receive content from multiple cloud resources simultaneously. Forexample, a user device can stream audio from one cloud resource whiledownloading content from a second cloud resource. Or a user device candownload content from multiple cloud resources for more efficientdownloading. In some embodiments, user equipment devices can use cloudresources for processing operations such as the processing operationsperformed by processing circuitry described in relation to FIG. 10.

As referred herein, the term “in response to” refers to initiated as aresult of. For example, a first action being performed in response to asecond action may include interstitial steps between the first actionand the second action. As referred herein, the term “directly inresponse to” refers to caused by. For example, a first action beingperformed directly in response to a second action may not includeinterstitial steps between the first action and the second action.

FIG. 12 is a flowchart of detailed illustrative process 1200 fordisplaying an Internet appliance timeline with content source mediaassets in accordance with some embodiments of the disclosure. It shouldbe noted that process 1200 or any step thereof could be performed on, orprovided by, any of the devices shown in FIGS. 10-11. For example,process 1200 may be executed by control circuitry 1004 (FIG. 10) asinstructed by a media guidance application implemented on a user device(e.g., user equipment devices 1102, 1104, and/or 1106 (FIG. 11)) inorder to manage user subscriptions to content sources. In addition, oneor more steps of process 1200 may be incorporated into or combined withone or more steps of any other process or embodiment described herein.

At step 1210, a first Internet appliance, external to user equipment, isintegrated with a plurality of content sources accessible to the userequipment. For example, control circuitry 1004 may receive user inputselecting a given Internet appliance (e.g., NEST camera) from firstdisplay region 150. In response to receiving a user selection of theNEST camera, control circuitry 1004 may assign an available virtualchannel (e.g., virtual channel 102) to the NEST camera in the channelspace that includes content source channels (e.g., television channels)and virtual channels (FIG. 1).

At step 1220, a simultaneous display of a first plurality of media assetlistings, corresponding to a first plurality of media assets transmittedby each of the plurality of content sources during a first time intervalthat includes the present time, and information received from the firstInternet appliance is generated. For example, control circuitry 1004 maygenerate for display screen 600 which includes media asset listings 610(e.g., “Gotham” transmitted by FOX, “The Voice” transmitted by NBC, “2Broke Girls” transmitted by CBS, etc.) and virtual channels 620representing information received from the appliances (e.g., NESTcamera) with identifying information associated with each appliance(FIG. 6).

At step 1230, a user request to navigate to a second time interval thatincludes a period of time that precedes the present time is received.For example, control circuitry 1004 may receive a user input navigatinga cursor to the left a number of times to shift the time interval thatis being displayed (e.g., from the current time to the past or previoustime).

At step 1240, in response to receiving the user request, a simultaneousdisplay of a second plurality of media asset listings, corresponding toa second plurality of media assets that were transmitted by each of theplurality of content sources during the second time interval, and afirst timeline that includes indicators representing activity detectedby the first Internet appliance during the second time interval isgenerated. For example, control circuitry 1004 may generate for displayscreen 700 which includes media asset listings 730 (e.g., “Gotham”transmitted by FOX, “The Voice” transmitted by NBC, “2 Broke Girls”transmitted by CBS, etc.) that were transmitted in a previous timeinterval (e.g., 8-9:30 PM where the current time is 10 PM) and virtualchannels 740 representing timeline 742 indicating activity detected bythe appliances (e.g., NEST camera) (FIG. 7).

It is contemplated that the steps or descriptions of FIG. 12 may be usedwith any other embodiment of this disclosure. In addition, the steps anddescriptions described in relation to FIG. 12 may be done in alternativeorders or in parallel to further the purposes of this disclosure. Forexample, each of these steps may be performed in any order or inparallel or substantially simultaneously to reduce lag or increase thespeed of the system or method. Any of these steps may also be skipped oromitted from the process. Furthermore, it should be noted that any ofthe devices or equipment discussed in relation to FIGS. 10-11 could beused to perform one or more of the steps in FIG. 12.

FIG. 13 is a flowchart of detailed illustrative process 1300 fordisplaying an Internet appliance timeline with content source mediaassets in accordance with some embodiments of the disclosure. It shouldbe noted that process 1300 or any step thereof could be performed on, orprovided by, any of the devices shown in FIGS. 10-11. For example,process 1300 may be executed by control circuitry 1004 (FIG. 10) asinstructed by a media guidance application implemented on a user device(e.g., user equipment devices 1102, 1104, and/or 1106 (FIG. 11)) inorder to display an Internet appliance timeline with content sourcemedia assets. In addition, one or more steps of process 1300 may beincorporated into or combined with one or more steps of any otherprocess or embodiment described herein.

At step 1310, a first Internet appliance, external to user equipment, isintegrated with a plurality of content sources accessible to the userequipment. For example, control circuitry 1004 may receive user inputselecting a given Internet appliance (e.g., NEST camera) from firstdisplay region 150. In response to receiving a user selection of theNEST camera, control circuitry 1004 may assign an available virtualchannel (e.g., virtual channel 102) to the NEST camera in the channelspace that includes content source channels (e.g., television channels)and virtual channels (FIG. 1).

At step 1320, a simultaneous display of a first plurality of media assetlistings, corresponding to a first plurality of media assets transmittedby each of the plurality of content sources during a first time intervalthat includes the present time, and information received from the firstInternet appliance is generated. For example, control circuitry 1004 maygenerate for display screen 600 which includes media asset listings 610(e.g., “Gotham” transmitted by FOX, “The Voice” transmitted by NBC, “2Broke Girls” transmitted by CBS, etc.) and virtual channels 620representing information received from the appliances (e.g., NESTcamera) with identifying information associated with each appliance(FIG. 6).

At step 1330, a user request to navigate to a second time interval thatincludes a period of time that precedes the present time is received.For example, control circuitry 1004 may receive a user input navigatinga cursor to the left a number of times to shift the time interval thatis being displayed (e.g., from the current time to the past or previoustime).

At step 1340, a database associated with the first Internet appliance issearched to identify activity detected by the first Internet applianceduring the second time interval. For example, control circuitry 1004 mayidentify a server associated with the NEST camera (e.g., a NEST server).Control circuitry 1004 may determine the past time interval that isbeing displayed (e.g., time interval 8-9:30 PM) and generate a query toa database hosted by the NEST server that includes the determined timeinterval, user account information associated with the NEST camera, aunique identifier (e.g., address) of the NEST camera, and a commandrequesting a list of activities detected during the time interval. Insome implementations, control circuitry 1004 may transmit the query to adatabase hosted locally by the user equipment which may have recordedthe various activities over the virtual channel and/or directly to adatabase stored on the selected NEST camera. Control circuitry 1004 mayreceive back the information (including the activity type and timepoint)requested from the database after the database is searched based on thequery. Control circuitry 1004 may determine the timepoint received fromthe database and the type of activity that was detected by theappliance.

At step 1350, a determination is made as to whether additionalactivities have been identified. In response to determining thatadditional activities have been identified, the process proceeds to step1360. Otherwise, the process proceeds to step 1370. For example, controlcircuitry 1004 may process the retrieved information from the databaseto determine whether any other activities were detected during the giventime interval.

At step 1360, a timepoint representing when the identified activity wasdetected by the first Internet appliance is retrieved. For example,control circuitry 1004 may process all of the retrieved activitiesdetected during the time interval and assign timepoints to each detectedactivity.

In step 1370, a first timeline having a length corresponding to thesecond time interval is generated. For example, control circuitry 1004may generate a timeline that represents a one hour and 30 minuteinterval (e.g., between 8-9:30 PM).

In step 1380, indicators are added to the first timeline at positionscorresponding to the retrieved timepoints representing when therespective activity was detected by the first Internet appliance. Forexample, control circuitry 1004 may identify where along the timelineeach of the detected activities belongs, based on the assignedtimepoints. The timepoints may also represent a duration rather than afixed point in time when the activity is detected over the course ofseveral minutes/hours. Control circuitry 1004 may also determine thetype of activity that was detected (e.g., motion or audio) and select anindicator type (e.g., circle or line) associated with that type ofactivity. Control circuitry 1004 may add the selected indicator to thetimeline at the assigned timepoint or range of timepoints.

At step 1390, in response to receiving the user request, a simultaneousdisplay of a second plurality of media asset listings, corresponding toa second plurality of media assets that were transmitted by each of theplurality of content sources during the second time interval, and thefirst timeline that includes the indicators representing activitydetected by the first Internet appliance during the second time intervalis generated. For example, control circuitry 1004 may generate fordisplay screen 700 which includes media asset listings 730 (e.g.,“Gotham” transmitted by FOX, “The Voice” transmitted by NBC, “2 BrokeGirls” transmitted by CBS, etc.) that were transmitted in a previoustime interval (e.g., 8-9:30 PM, where the current time is 10 PM) andvirtual channels 740 representing timeline 742 indicating activitydetected by the appliances (e.g., NEST camera) (FIG. 7).

It is contemplated that the steps or descriptions of FIG. 13 may be usedwith any other embodiment of this disclosure. In addition, the steps anddescriptions described in relation to FIG. 13 may be done in alternativeorders or in parallel to further the purposes of this disclosure. Forexample, each of these steps may be performed in any order or inparallel or substantially simultaneously to reduce lag or increase thespeed of the system or method. Any of these steps may also be skipped oromitted from the process. Furthermore, it should be noted that any ofthe devices or equipment discussed in relation to FIGS. 10-11 could beused to perform one or more of the steps in FIG. 13.

FIG. 14 is a flowchart of detailed illustrative process 1400 forintegrating an Internet appliance with a plurality of content sources inaccordance with some embodiments of the disclosure. It should be notedthat process 1400 or any step thereof could be performed on, or providedby, any of the devices shown in FIGS. 10-11. For example, process 1400may be executed by control circuitry 1004 (FIG. 10) as instructed by amedia guidance application implemented on a user device (e.g., userequipment devices 1102, 1104, and/or 1106 (FIG. 11)) in order tointegrate an Internet appliance with a plurality of content sources. Inaddition, one or more steps of process 1400 may be incorporated into orcombined with one or more steps of any other process or embodimentdescribed herein.

At step 1410, a process for integrating a first Internet appliance,external to user equipment, with a plurality of content sourcesaccessible to the user equipment begins. For example, control circuitry1004 may execute a subroutine that integrates the appliance with contentsources on the user equipment.

At step 1420, a plurality of Internet appliances are detected on anetwork local to the user equipment. For example, control circuitry 1004may issue a discovery request (e.g., in accordance with a UPnP protocol)to a local network associated with the user equipment. Each devicecoupled to the network (e.g., each Internet appliance connected to thehome network) may respond (e.g., according to the UPnP protocol) withparameters identifying the appliance including its capabilities, addressinformation, manufacturer, type, etc.

At step 1430, the address of each of the detected plurality of Internetappliances is identified. For example, control circuitry 1004 mayreceive and store in storage 1008 the address and parameters of eachresponding appliance.

At step 1440, based on the identified address, a database of Internetappliances is searched to determine a type, identifier, and manufacturerof each of the detected plurality of Internet appliances. For example,control circuitry 1004 may transmit a query to a local or remotedatabase with an address or some of the information contained in theparameters it receives from each appliance. Multiple databases may besearched (e.g., one for each type/manufacturer of the appliances that isdetected). The database may return to control circuitry 1004 informationassociated with each address of each detected appliance. For example,the database may provide an API associated with each appliance tocontrol circuitry 1004. The API may be used by control circuitry 1004 tofurther communicate/instruct the given appliance to perform a function(e.g., retrieve a timeline, perform trick play, provide recordedvideo/audio, provide activity information, etc.). The database mayalternatively or in addition provide an address or contact informationof another aggregating server that hosts multiple APIs of variousappliances. In such circumstances, control circuitry 1004 maycommunicate with each of the appliances via the aggregating server byissuing commands to the aggregating server and having the aggregatingserver use its locally stored APIs to communicate with the appliances orservers associated with the appliances.

At step 1450, a list of available Internet appliances that includes thefirst Internet appliance is generated for display in a first displayregion. For example, control circuitry 1004 may generate for display infirst display region 150 identifiers of each detected applianceincluding some or all of the information contained in the parameterseach appliance transmitted to control circuitry 1004 (FIG. 1).

At step 1460, a determination is made as to whether user input thatdrags the first Internet appliance from the first display region to asecond display region has been received. In response to determiningthat, the process proceeds to step 1470. Otherwise, the process proceedsto step 1450. For example, control circuitry 1004 may determine if theuser positioned a cursor over a given identifier that is displayed inregion 150, pressed a command button (e.g., a SELECT button) and draggedor pressed a directional arrow to a second display region 130 andstopped pressing the command button or pressed the command button againto stop the dragging operation (FIG. 1)

At step 1470, a channel space of the user equipment that includes aplurality of content source channels associated with the plurality ofcontent sources and a plurality of virtual channels associated withInternet appliances is identified. For example, control circuitry 1004may retrieve from storage 1008 a list of channels and their associatedcontent source or appliance. For example, control circuitry 1004 mayretrieve a list that indicates channels 1-99 are assigned to channelsthat transmit content from a content provider source (e.g., televisionchannel) to a plurality of users at scheduled time intervals and virtualchannels 100-110 are available to assign to local Internet appliances.

At step 1480, one of the plurality of virtual channels is selected. Forexample, control circuitry 1004 may analyze the assignments of virtualchannels 100-110 to determine whether any of the channels is notassigned to an appliance. In particular, control circuitry 1004 maydetermine whether an appliance API, parameters, and/or address isassociated with a given one of the virtual channels. Control circuitry1004 may select one of the virtual channels that is available and notassigned or associated with any appliances. If all of the virtualchannels are assigned, control circuitry 1004 may replace one of theassigned appliances based on a priority scheme with the appliance mostrecently selected by the user at step 1460. Alternatively, or inaddition, control circuitry 1004 may prompt the user to select a givenappliance to remove from the virtual channel assignment, and followingconfirmation of removal, control circuitry 1004 may associate theappliance selected at step 1460 with the removed assignment.Alternatively, or in addition, control circuitry 1004 may analyze theactivity timelines (in the lifetime of the appliance or within athreshold period of time previous to the current time). Controlcircuitry 1004 may identify the appliance with the least amount ofactivity detected in the activity timeline and may automatically removethat appliance from the virtual channel that is assigned to theappliance. Control circuitry 1004 may then associate the applianceselected at step 1460 with the virtual channel that has becomeavailable.

At step 1490, a determination is made as to whether the selected virtualchannel is currently assigned to an Internet appliance. In response todetermining that the selected virtual channel is currently assigned toan Internet appliance, the process proceeds to step 1480 to selectanother virtual channel. Otherwise, the process proceeds to step 1491.

At step 1491, the channel space is modified to associate the selectedvirtual channel with the first Internet appliance by associating avirtual channel number, the determined identifier, type, andmanufacturer with the first Internet appliance. For example, controlcircuitry 1004 may store in storage 1008 the parameters and/oridentifier of the selected appliance for the selected virtual channel.

It is contemplated that the steps or descriptions of FIG. 14 may be usedwith any other embodiment of this disclosure. In addition, the steps anddescriptions described in relation to FIG. 14 may be done in alternativeorders or in parallel to further the purposes of this disclosure. Forexample, each of these steps may be performed in any order or inparallel or substantially simultaneously to reduce lag or increase thespeed of the system or method. Any of these steps may also be skipped oromitted from the process. Furthermore, it should be noted that any ofthe devices or equipment discussed in relation to FIGS. 10-11 could beused to perform one or more of the steps in FIG. 14.

FIG. 15 is a flowchart of detailed illustrative process 1500 fordisplaying Internet appliances based on a manufacturer in accordancewith some embodiments of the disclosure. It should be noted that process1500 or any step thereof could be performed on, or provided by, any ofthe devices shown in FIGS. 10-11. For example, process 1500 may beexecuted by control circuitry 1004 (FIG. 10) as instructed by a mediaguidance application implemented on a user device (e.g., user equipmentdevices 1102, 1104, and/or 1106 (FIG. 11)) in order to display Internetappliances based on a manufacturer. In addition, one or more steps ofprocess 1500 may be incorporated into or combined with one or more stepsof any other process or embodiment described herein.

At step 1510, a user selection of an option to view a list of integratedInternet appliances, including the first Internet appliance, isreceived. For example, control circuitry 1004 may receive a userselection of a SHOW APPLIANCES button on a remote control.

At step 1520, a manufacturer of each integrated Internet appliance inthe list is determined. For example, control circuitry 1004 may analyzethe virtual channels stored in storage 1008 to retrieve the parametersof each appliance associated with a given virtual channel. Controlcircuitry 1004 may process the parameters to identify the manufacturerof each appliance.

At step 1530, a first set of integrated Internet appliances associatedwith a first manufacturer and a second set of integrated Internetappliances associated with a second manufacturer are generated. Forexample, control circuitry 1004 may generate a list for eachmanufacturer that is determined. In each list, control circuitry 1004may store the parameters (e.g., device ID, address, type, etc.) of eachdevice associated with the given manufacturer associated with the list.For example, in a NEST list, control circuitry 1004 may store NESTcamera 1, NEST camera 2, and NEST camera doorbell as the detectedappliances and in a RING list, control circuitry 1004 may store RINGcamera 1 and RING doorbell as the detected appliances.

At step 1540, a plurality of rows is generated for display, wherein afirst of the plurality of rows is associated with the firstmanufacturer, and where a second of the plurality of rows is associatedwith the second manufacturer. For example, control circuitry 1004 maydisplay first row 510 associated with RING manufacturer and second row520 associated with NEST manufacturer (FIG. 5).

At step 1550, a first plurality of cells, each representing contentassociated with each of the first set of integrated Internet appliances,is generated for display in the first row. For example, controlcircuitry 1004 may determine how many appliances are included in thefirst list. Control circuitry 1004 may generate a number of cellscorresponding to the number of appliances in the first list. Controlcircuitry 1004 may display cells 512, 514 and 516 representing eachappliance in the first list. In each cell, control circuitry 1004 mayinclude content captured by each given appliance and/or parametersassociated with each appliance and/or a timeline of activity detected byeach appliance. For example, cell 512 may present video captured by theRING doorbell and cell 514 may present video captured by the RING camerain the living room.

At step 1560, a second plurality of cells, each representing contentassociated with each of the second set of integrated Internetappliances, is generated for display in the second row. For example,control circuitry 1004 may determine how many appliances are included inthe second list. Control circuitry 1004 may generate a number of cellscorresponding to the number of appliances in the second list. Controlcircuitry 1004 may display cells 522 and 524 representing each appliancein the first list. In each cell, control circuitry 1004 may includecontent captured by each given appliance and/or parameters associatedwith each appliance and/or a timeline of activity detected by eachappliance. For example, cell 522 may present video captured by the NESTcamera in the bedroom and cell 524 may present video captured by theNEST camera in the living room.

It is contemplated that the steps or descriptions of FIG. 15 may be usedwith any other embodiment of this disclosure. In addition, the steps anddescriptions described in relation to FIG. 15 may be done in alternativeorders or in parallel to further the purposes of this disclosure. Forexample, each of these steps may be performed in any order or inparallel or substantially simultaneously to reduce lag or increase thespeed of the system or method. Any of these steps may also be skipped oromitted from the process. Furthermore, it should be noted that any ofthe devices or equipment discussed in relation to FIGS. 10-11 could beused to perform one or more of the steps in FIG. 15.

FIG. 16 is a flowchart of detailed illustrative process 1600 forbrowsing Internet appliances in accordance with some embodiments of thedisclosure. It should be noted that process 1600 or any step thereofcould be performed on, or provided by, any of the devices shown in FIGS.10-11. For example, process 1600 may be executed by control circuitry1004 (FIG. 10) as instructed by a media guidance application implementedon a user device (e.g., user equipment devices 1102, 1104, and/or 1106(FIG. 11)) in order to browse Internet appliances. In addition, one ormore steps of process 1600 may be incorporated into or combined with oneor more steps of any other process or embodiment described herein.

At step 1610, video from a first of the content sources is displayed.For example, control circuitry 1004 may tune to a given channel (e.g.,channel ABC) and present video 220 received over that channel that isbroadcast to a plurality of users at a scheduled time (FIG. 2).

At step 1620, data from the first Internet appliance indicating that thefirst Internet appliance detected activity is received. For example,control circuitry 1004 may receive an indication from a RING doorbellthat motion was detected by the appliance.

At step 1630, a notification associated with the first Internetappliance that includes the received data is presented simultaneouslywith the video from the first of the content sources, wherein the dataincludes an image of the detected activity and a description of thedetected activity. For example, control circuitry 1004 may presentnotification 210 as an overlay on top of video 220 being displayed (FIG.2).

At step 1640, a determination is made as to whether a user request tobrowse content has been received. In response to determining that, theprocess proceeds to step 1650. Otherwise, the process proceeds to step1610. For example, control circuitry 1004 may determine whether the userpressed the up arrow or browse button on a remote control indicatingthat the user requests to browse content (e.g., content scheduled fortransmission on other channels or content being captured by Internetappliances on virtual channels).

At step 1650, a browse region in which content information is presentedfor a selected one of the content sources associated with a currentchannel number is presented together with the video received from afirst of the content sources. For example, control circuitry 1004 maypresent browse region 310 (FIG. 3), rows 510/520 (FIG. 5), and/ordisplay 600/700 (FIGS. 6 and 7).

At step 1660, user input to navigate to a subsequent content source in alist of content sources, wherein the subsequent content source isassociated with a channel number that is higher or lower in a sequenceof channels, is received. For example, control circuitry 1004 mayreceive a user selection of the right arrow to navigate to subsequentchannels in browse region 310 (FIG. 3) and/or the down arrow to navigateto subsequent channels in rows 510/520 (FIG. 5) and/or display 600/700(FIGS. 6 and 7).

At step 1670, the current channel number is incremented or decrementedto determine a next channel number. For example, control circuitry 1004may determine the channel number or virtual channel number of theinformation presented currently in browse region 310. In particular,browse region 310 may currently be displaying information for contentscheduled for transmission tomorrow at 3 PM on channel 99 (e.g., CBS)while video currently received on channel ABC is being presented. Insuch circumstances, the next channel number is determined to be virtualchannel 100 if the user presses the left arrow button.

At step 1680, a determination is made as to whether the next channelnumber corresponds to a content source channel. In response todetermining that the next channel number corresponds to a content sourcechannel, the process proceeds to step 1682. Otherwise, the processproceeds to step 1684.

At step 1682, the content source that corresponds to the next channelnumber is selected as the selected one of the content sources.

At step 1684, it is determined whether the first Internet appliance isassociated with the next channel number. For example, control circuitry1004 may determine that the next channel (virtual channel 100)corresponds to an Internet appliance (e.g., RING doorbell).

At step 1686, information associated with the first Internet applianceand live video being captured by the first Internet appliance areretrieved from the identified first Internet appliance. For example,control circuitry 1004 may transmit a communication to the RING doorbell(e.g., either directly or through aggregation server or RING server)requesting live video and/or activity information.

At step 1688, the retrieved information and live video being captured bythe first Internet appliance are presented in the browse region. Forexample, control circuitry 1004 may present an icon representing RINGdoorbell and/or live video being captured by the RING doorbell togetherwith the video being received from the content source (FIG. 3).

At step 1690, a user request to perform a trick play operation on thelive video presented in the browse region is received. For example,while the cursor is positioned over the RING doorbell in browse region310, control circuitry 1004 may receive a user input requesting torewind the video received from the RING doorbell.

At step 1692, in response to receiving the user request, stored videoassociated with the first Internet appliance that includes videocaptured by the first Internet appliance at a time in the past isretrieved. For example, control circuitry 1004 may access a localstorage device that stores video received over the virtual channel toaccess previously captured points in time. For example, controlcircuitry 1004 may communicate with the RING doorbell (directly, viaaggregation server, or RING server) to request stored video representingpreviously captured points in time. Control circuitry 1004 may presentthe retrieved stored video in browse region 310 in place of the livevideo that was being presented. The retrieved stored video may bepresented together with the video currently received from the contentsource channel.

It is contemplated that the steps or descriptions of FIG. 16 may be usedwith any other embodiment of this disclosure. In addition, the steps anddescriptions described in relation to FIG. 16 may be done in alternativeorders or in parallel to further the purposes of this disclosure. Forexample, each of these steps may be performed in any order or inparallel or substantially simultaneously to reduce lag or increase thespeed of the system or method. Any of these steps may also be skipped oromitted from the process. Furthermore, it should be noted that any ofthe devices or equipment discussed in relation to FIGS. 10-11 could beused to perform one or more of the steps in FIG. 16.

FIG. 17 is a flowchart of detailed illustrative process 1700 forrecording content from Internet appliances in accordance with someembodiments of the disclosure. It should be noted that process 1700 orany step thereof could be performed on, or provided by, any of thedevices shown in FIGS. 10-11. For example, process 1700 may be executedby control circuitry 1004 (FIG. 10) as instructed by a media guidanceapplication implemented on a user device (e.g., user equipment devices1102, 1104, and/or 1106 (FIG. 11)) in order to record content fromInternet appliances. In addition, one or more steps of process 1700 maybe incorporated into or combined with one or more steps of any otherprocess or embodiment described herein.

At step 1710, a first media asset received from a first of the contentsources is recorded. For example, control circuitry 1004 may receive auser request to record a program at a scheduled transmission time for aparticular source (e.g., “Seinfeld” received from ABC channel at 7 PMtomorrow).

At step 1720, a user selection of the information received from thefirst Internet appliance is received. For example, control circuitry1004 may receive a user selection of information 622 presented in screen600 (FIG. 6). In particular, the user may navigate a cursor fromhighlighting the media asset listing (“The Bachelor” transmitted by ABCcontent source) down to highlight “Front Door” information received fromRING doorbell. Control circuitry 1004 may receive a user selection ofthe SELECT button while highlighting “Front Door” information 622.

At step 1730, in response to receiving the user selection, an option toschedule for recording video received, at a designated future time, fromthe first Internet appliance on a local storage device of the userequipment is generated for display. For example, control circuitry 1004may present recording options similar to options presented for a typicaltelevision program to schedule for recording content captured in thefuture or currently from the corresponding appliance (e.g., RINGdoorbell). The user may specify recording criteria for triggering thelocal recording of the content captured by the RING doorbell.

At step 1740, in response to receiving a user selection of the option torecord, video received from the first Internet appliance is recorded.For example, control circuitry 1004 may access the video captured by theRING doorbell at the specified future time (e.g., tomorrow at 8 PM) orwhen the criteria is met and begin storing the content on a localstorage device (e.g., the DVR) on which programs received from contentsources are recorded.

At step 1750, in response to receiving a user request to view adirectory of recorded content, a first media listing associated with thefirst media asset that has been recorded and a recording indicatorassociated with the first Internet appliance indicating that the videofrom the first Internet appliance was recorded are generated fordisplay.

It is contemplated that the steps or descriptions of FIG. 17 may be usedwith any other embodiment of this disclosure. In addition, the steps anddescriptions described in relation to FIG. 17 may be done in alternativeorders or in parallel to further the purposes of this disclosure. Forexample, each of these steps may be performed in any order or inparallel or substantially simultaneously to reduce lag or increase thespeed of the system or method. Any of these steps may also be skipped oromitted from the process. Furthermore, it should be noted that any ofthe devices or equipment discussed in relation to FIGS. 10-11 could beused to perform one or more of the steps in FIG. 17.

FIG. 18 is a flowchart of detailed illustrative process 1800 fordisplaying content according to activity timelines from Internetappliances in accordance with some embodiments of the disclosure. Itshould be noted that process 1800 or any step thereof could be performedon, or provided by, any of the devices shown in FIGS. 10-11. Forexample, process 1800 may be executed by control circuitry 1004 (FIG.10) as instructed by a media guidance application implemented on a userdevice (e.g., user equipment devices 1102, 1104, and/or 1106 (FIG. 11))in order to display content according to activity timelines fromInternet appliances. In addition, one or more steps of process 1800 maybe incorporated into or combined with one or more steps of any otherprocess or embodiment described herein.

At step 1810, a detected second appliance is retrieved using userequipment, the second Internet appliance being associated with adifferent manufacturer than the first Internet appliance, and the secondInternet appliance being of a different type than the first Internetappliance. For example, control circuitry 1004 may access storage 1008to identify another appliance that was detected during discovery oflocal appliances (e.g., NEST camera or RING camera).

At step 1820, a database associated with a second Internet appliance issearched to identify activity detected by the second Internet appliance.For example, control circuitry 1004 may identify a server associatedwith the RING doorbell (e.g., a RING server). Control circuitry 1004 maydetermine the past time interval that is being displayed (e.g., timeinterval 8-9:30 PM) and generate a query to a database hosted by theRING server that includes the determined time interval, user accountinformation associated with the RING camera, a unique identifier (e.g.,address) of the RING doorbell, and a command requesting a list ofactivities detected during the time interval. In some implementations,control circuitry 1004 may transmit the query to a database hostedlocally by the user equipment which may have recorded the variousactivities over the virtual channel and/or directly to a database storedon the selected RING doorbell. Control circuitry 1004 may receive backthe information (including the activity type and timepoint) requestedfrom the database after the database is searched based on the query.Control circuitry 1004 may determine the timepoint received from thedatabase and the type of activity that was detected by the appliance.

At step 1830, a timepoint representing when the identified activity wasdetected by the second Internet appliance is retrieved from a databaseassociated with the second Internet appliance. For example, controlcircuitry 1004 may process all of the retrieved activities detectedduring the time interval and assign timepoints to each detectedactivity.

At step 1840, a second timeline having a length corresponding to thesecond time interval is generated. For example, control circuitry 1004may generate a timeline that represents a one hour and 30 minuteinterval (e.g., between 8-9:30 PM).

At step 1850, a determination is made as to whether activity is detectedduring the second time interval. In response to determining thatactivity is detected during the second time interval, the processproceeds to step 1860. Otherwise, the process proceeds to step 1830.

At step 1860, indicators are added to the second timeline at positionscorresponding to the retrieved timepoints representing when therespective activity was detected by the second Internet appliance. Forexample, control circuitry 1004 may identify where along the timelineeach of the detected activities belongs, based on the assignedtimepoints. The timepoints may also represent a duration rather than afixed point in time when the activity is detected over the course ofseveral minutes/hours. Control circuitry 1004 may also determine thetype of activity that was detected (e.g., motion or audio) and select anindicator type (e.g., circle or line) associated with that type ofactivity. Control circuitry 1004 may add the selected indicator to thetimeline at the assigned timepoint or range of timepoints.

At step 1862, a simultaneous display of the second plurality of mediaasset listings, the first timeline that includes the indicatorsrepresenting activity detected by the first Internet appliance duringthe second time interval, and a second timeline that includes indicatorsrepresenting activity detected by a second Internet appliance during thesecond time interval is generated. For example, control circuitry 1004may generate for display screen 700 which includes media asset listings730 (e.g., “Gotham” transmitted by FOX, “The Voice” transmitted by NBC,“2 Broke Girls” transmitted by CBS, etc.) that were transmitted in aprevious time interval (e.g., 8-9:30 PM, where the current time is 10PM) and virtual channels 740 representing first timeline 742 indicatingactivity detected by the first appliance (e.g., NEST camera) and secondtimeline 744 indicating activity detected by the second appliance (e.g.,RING doorbell) (FIG. 7).

At step 1870, a cursor is navigated to a first indicator that representsa first activity detected by the first Internet appliance. For example,control circuitry 1004 may receive a user input navigating a cursor tofirst indicator 710 representing motion detected by the first appliance.

At step 1880, a user request is received to sequentially present contentassociated with the activities detected by the first and second Internetappliances, starting from a point in time associated with the firstindicator. For example, control circuitry 1004 may receive a userselection of a PLAY button on a remote control.

At step 1890, content representing the first activity detected by thefirst Internet appliance is generated for display. For example, controlcircuitry 1004 may access a storage device (local or remote on a serverassociated with the first appliance) to retrieve content captured by theappliance during the timepoint represented by first indicator 710 (FIG.7).

At step 1892, activities detected by each of the detected Internetappliances are searched for a next activity that follows the firstactivity sequentially. For example, control circuitry 1004 may searchall of the activity timelines displayed in screen 700 to identify thenext chronological timepoint that sequentially follows the timepointrepresented by first indicator 710.

At step 1894, a determination is made as to whether the second indicatorrepresents the next activity detected by the second Internet appliance,that follows the first activity sequentially. In response to determiningthat the second indicator represents the next activity detected by thesecond Internet appliance that follows the first activity sequentially,the process proceeds to step 1896. Otherwise, the process proceeds tostep 1898.

At step 1896, content, detected by the second Internet appliancerepresenting the next activity following the content representing thefirst activity, is automatically generated for display. For example,indicator 712 may be determined to chronologically and sequentiallyfollow the timepoint represented by the selected indicator 710. As aresult, control circuitry may determine that indicator 712 representsactivity detected by the second appliance and access a storage device(local or remote on a server associated with the second appliance) toretrieve content captured by the second appliance during the timepointrepresented by second indicator 712 (FIG. 7).

At step 1898, content, detected by the first Internet appliancerepresenting the next activity following the content representing thefirst activity, is automatically generated for display. For example,indicator 714 may be determined to chronologically and sequentiallyfollow the timepoint represented by second indicator 712. As a result,control circuitry may determine that indicator 714 represents activitydetected by the first appliance and access a storage device (local orremote on a server associated with the first appliance) to retrievecontent captured by the second appliance during the timepointrepresented by second indicator 714 (FIG. 7).

It is contemplated that the steps or descriptions of FIG. 18 may be usedwith any other embodiment of this disclosure. In addition, the steps anddescriptions described in relation to FIG. 18 may be done in alternativeorders or in parallel to further the purposes of this disclosure. Forexample, each of these steps may be performed in any order or inparallel or substantially simultaneously to reduce lag or increase thespeed of the system or method. Any of these steps may also be skipped oromitted from the process. Furthermore, it should be noted that any ofthe devices or equipment discussed in relation to FIGS. 10-11 could beused to perform one or more of the steps in FIG. 18.

The above-described embodiments of the present disclosure are presentedfor purposes of illustration and not of limitation, and the presentdisclosure is limited only by the claims that follow. Furthermore, itshould be noted that the features and limitations described in any oneembodiment may be applied to any other embodiment herein, and flowchartsor examples relating to one embodiment may be combined with any otherembodiment in a suitable manner, done in different orders, or done inparallel. It should also be noted, the systems and/or methods describedabove may be applied to, or used in accordance with, other systemsand/or methods.

What is claimed is:
 1. A method for navigating to activity informationreceived from an appliance using a media guidance application, themethod comprising: integrating a first Internet appliance, external touser equipment, with a plurality of content sources accessible to theuser equipment; generating a simultaneous display of a first pluralityof media asset listings, corresponding to a first plurality of mediaassets transmitted by each of the plurality of content sources during afirst time interval that includes the present time, and informationreceived from the first Internet appliance; receiving a user request tonavigate to a second time interval that includes a period of time thatprecedes the present time; searching a database associated with thefirst Internet appliance to identify activity detected by the firstInternet appliance during the second time interval; for each identifiedactivity, retrieving, from the database, a timepoint representing whenthe identified activity was detected by the first Internet appliance;generating a first timeline having a length corresponding to the secondtime interval; adding indicators to the first timeline at positionscorresponding to the retrieved timepoints representing when therespective activity was detected by the first Internet appliance; and inresponse to receiving the user request, generating a simultaneousdisplay of a second plurality of media asset listings, corresponding toa second plurality of media assets that were transmitted by each of theplurality of content sources during the second time interval, and thefirst timeline that includes the indicators representing activitydetected by the first Internet appliance during the second timeinterval, wherein the first timeline is synchronized with the secondtime interval such that the positions of the indicators in the firsttimeline are indicative of at least one media asset of the plurality ofsecond media assets being broadcast when the respective activity wasdetected by the first Internet appliance.
 2. The method of claim 1,wherein the integrating comprises: detecting on a network local to theuser equipment a plurality of Internet appliances; determining a type,identifier, and manufacturer of each of the detected plurality ofInternet appliances based on an address of each of the detectedplurality of Internet appliances; generating for display in a firstdisplay region a list of detected Internet appliances that includes thefirst Internet appliance; receiving user input that drags the firstInternet appliance from the first display region to a second displayregion; and in response to the user input: identifying a channel spaceof the user equipment that includes a plurality of content sourcechannels associated with the plurality of content sources and aplurality of virtual channels associated with Internet appliances;searching the virtual channels to identify a first virtual channel thatis not currently assigned to an Internet appliance; modifying thechannel space to associate the first virtual channel with the firstInternet appliance by associating a virtual channel number, thedetermined identifier, type, and manufacturer with the first Internetappliance.
 3. The method of claim 1, wherein the first Internetappliance is a user Internet video camera, further comprising:presenting, together with video received from a first of the contentsources, a browse region in which content information is presented for asecond of the content sources associated with a current channel number;receiving user input to navigate to a subsequent content source in alist of content sources, wherein the subsequent content source isassociated with a channel number that is higher or lower in a sequenceof channels; and presenting in the browse region information associatedwith the first Internet appliance and live video being received by thefirst Internet appliance in response to determining that the firstInternet appliance is a next content source in the list of contentsources and is associated with a channel number that sequentiallyfollows the current channel number being presented in response to theuser input.
 4. The method of claim 3 further comprising: receiving auser request to perform a trick play operation on the live videopresented in the browse region; and in response to receiving the userrequest, retrieving stored video associated with the first Internetappliance that includes video captured by the first Internet applianceat a time in the past.
 5. The method of claim 1 further comprising:receiving a user selection of an option to view a list of integratedInternet appliances including the first Internet appliance; determininga manufacturer of each integrated Internet appliance in the list;generating a first set of integrated Internet appliances associated witha first manufacturer and a second set of integrated Internet appliancesassociated with a second manufacturer; generating for display aplurality of rows, wherein a first of the plurality of rows isassociated with the first manufacturer, and where a second of theplurality of rows is associated with the second manufacturer; generatingfor display, in the first row, a first plurality of cells eachrepresenting content associated with each of the first set of integratedInternet appliances; and generating for display, in the second row, asecond plurality of cells each representing content associated with eachof the second set of integrated Internet appliances.
 6. The method ofclaim 1 further comprising: displaying video from a first of the contentsources; receiving data from the first Internet appliance indicatingthat the first Internet appliance detected activity; and presenting anotification associated with the first Internet appliance that includesthe received data simultaneously with the video from the first of thecontent sources, wherein the data includes an image of the detectedactivity and a description of the detected activity.
 7. The method ofclaim 1 further comprising: recording a first media asset received froma first of the content sources; receiving a user selection of theinformation received from the first Internet appliance in response toreceiving the user selection, generating for display an option toschedule for recording video received, at a designated future time, fromthe first Internet appliance on a local storage device of the userequipment; in response to receiving a user selection of the option torecord, recording video received from the first Internet appliance; andin response to receiving a user request to view a directory of recordedcontent, generating for display a first media listing associated withthe first media asset that has been recorded and a recording indicatorassociated with the first Internet appliance indicating that the videofrom the first Internet appliance was recorded.
 8. The method of claim1, wherein generating the simultaneous display of the second pluralityof media asset listings further comprises: searching a databaseassociated with a second Internet appliance to identify activitydetected by the second Internet appliance during the second timeinterval, wherein the second Internet appliance is associated with adifferent manufacturer than the first Internet appliance, and whereinthe second Internet appliance is of a different type than the firstInternet appliance; for each identified activity, retrieving, from thedatabase associated with the second Internet appliance, a timepointrepresenting when the identified activity was detected by the secondInternet appliance; generating a second timeline having a lengthcorresponding to the second time interval; adding indicators to thesecond timeline at positions corresponding to the retrieved timepointsrepresenting when the respective activity was detected by the secondInternet appliance; and generating a simultaneous display of the secondplurality of media asset listings, the first timeline that includes theindicators representing activity detected by the first Internetappliance during the second time interval, and a second timeline thatincludes indicators representing activity detected by a second Internetappliance during the second time interval.
 9. The method of claim 8,wherein the indicators included in the first and second timelinesinclude a first plurality of indicators of a first type and a secondplurality of indicators of a second type, wherein the first plurality ofindicators represent a first type of activity detected at differentpoints in time, wherein the second plurality of indicators represent asecond type of activity detected at different points in time, whereinthe first plurality of indicators are visually distinguished from thesecond plurality of indicators.
 10. The method of claim 8 furthercomprising: navigating a cursor to a first indicator that represents afirst activity detected by the first Internet appliance; receiving auser request to sequentially present content associated the activitiesdetected by the first and second Internet appliances starting from apoint in time associated with the first indicator; generating fordisplay content representing the first activity detected by the firstInternet appliance; determining that a second indicator that representsa second activity detected by the second Internet appliance ispositioned between the first indicator and a third indicator thatrepresents third activity detected by the first Internet appliance; andin response to the determining, automatically generating for displaycontent representing the second activity following the contentrepresenting the first activity.
 11. A system for navigating to activityinformation received from an appliance using a media guidanceapplication, the system comprising: control circuitry configured to:integrate a first Internet appliance, external to user equipment, with aplurality of content sources accessible to the user equipment; generatea simultaneous display of a first plurality of media asset listings,corresponding to a first plurality of media assets transmitted by eachof the plurality of content sources during a first time interval thatincludes the present time, and information received from the firstInternet appliance; receive a user request to navigate to a second timeinterval that includes a period of time that precedes the present time;search a database associated with the first Internet appliance toidentify activity detected by the first Internet appliance during thesecond time interval; for each identified activity, retrieve, from thedatabase, a timepoint representing when the identified activity wasdetected by the first Internet appliance; generate a first timelinehaving a length corresponding to the second time interval; addindicators to the first timeline at positions corresponding to theretrieved timepoints representing when the respective activity wasdetected by the first Internet appliance; and in response to receivingthe user request, generate a simultaneous display of a second pluralityof media asset listings, corresponding to a second plurality of mediaassets that were transmitted by each of the plurality of content sourcesduring the second time interval, and the first timeline that includesthe indicators representing activity detected by the first Internetappliance during the second time interval, wherein the first timeline issynchronized with the second time interval such that the positions ofthe indicators in the first timeline are indicative of at least onemedia asset of the plurality of second media assets being broadcast whenthe respective activity was detected by the first Internet appliance.12. The system of claim 11, wherein the control circuitry is configuredto integrate by: detecting on a network local to the user equipment aplurality of Internet appliances; determining a type, identifier, andmanufacturer of each of the detected plurality of Internet appliancesbased on an address of each of the detected plurality of Internetappliances; generating for display in a first display region a list ofdetected Internet appliances that includes the first Internet appliance;receiving user input that drags the first Internet appliance from thefirst display region to a second display region; and in response to theuser input: identifying a channel space of the user equipment thatincludes a plurality of content source channels associated with theplurality of content sources and a plurality of virtual channelsassociated with Internet appliances; searching the virtual channels toidentify a first virtual channel that is not currently assigned to anInternet appliance; modifying the channel space to associate the firstvirtual channel with the first Internet appliance by associating avirtual channel number, the determined identifier, type, andmanufacturer with the first Internet appliance.
 13. The system of claim11, wherein the first Internet appliance is a user Internet videocamera, and wherein the control circuitry is further configured to:present, together with video received from a first of the contentsources, a browse region in which content information is presented for asecond of the content sources associated with a current channel number;receive user input to navigate to a subsequent content source in a listof content sources, wherein the subsequent content source is associatedwith a channel number that is higher or lower in a sequence of channels;and present in the browse region information associated with the firstInternet appliance and live video being captured by the first Internetappliance in response to determining that the first Internet applianceis a next content source in the list of content sources and isassociated with a channel number that sequentially follows the currentchannel number being presented in response to the user input.
 14. Thesystem of claim 13, wherein the control circuitry is further configuredto: receive a user request to perform a trick play operation on the livevideo presented in the browse region; and in response to receiving theuser request, retrieve stored video associated with the first Internetappliance that includes video captured by the first Internet applianceat a time in the past.
 15. The system of claim 11, wherein the controlcircuitry is further configured to: receive a user selection of anoption to view a list of integrated Internet appliances including thefirst Internet appliance; determine a manufacturer of each integratedInternet appliance in the list; generate a first set of integratedInternet appliances associated with a first manufacturer and a secondset of integrated Internet appliances associated with a secondmanufacturer; generate for display a plurality of rows, wherein a firstof the plurality of rows is associated with the first manufacturer, andwhere a second of the plurality of rows is associated with the secondmanufacturer; generate for display, in the first row, a first pluralityof cells each representing content associated with each of the first setof integrated Internet appliances; and generate for display, in thesecond row, a second plurality of cells each representing contentassociated with each of the second set of integrated Internetappliances.
 16. The system of claim 11, wherein the control circuitry isfurther configured to: display video from a first of the contentsources; receive data from the first Internet appliance indicating thatthe first Internet appliance detected activity; and present anotification associated with the first Internet appliance that includesthe received data simultaneously with the video from the first of thecontent sources, wherein the data includes an image of the detectedactivity and a description of the detected activity.
 17. The system ofclaim 11, wherein the control circuitry is further configured to: recorda first media asset received from a first of the content sources;receive a user selection of the information received from the firstInternet appliance in response to receiving the user selection, generatefor display an option to schedule for recording video received, at adesignated future time, from the first Internet appliance on a localstorage device of the user equipment; in response to receiving a userselection of the option to record, record video received from the firstInternet appliance; and in response to receiving a user request to viewa directory of recorded content, generate for display a first medialisting associated with the first media asset that has been recorded anda recording indicator associated with the first Internet applianceindicating that the video from the first Internet appliance wasrecorded.
 18. The system of claim 11, wherein the control circuitry isconfigured to generate the simultaneous display of the second pluralityof media asset listings by: searching a database associated with asecond Internet appliance to identify activity detected by the secondInternet appliance during the second time interval, wherein the secondInternet appliance is associated with a different manufacturer than thefirst Internet appliance, and wherein the second Internet appliance isof a different type than the first Internet appliance; for eachidentified activity, retrieving, from the database associated with thesecond Internet appliance, a timepoint representing when the identifiedactivity was detected by the second Internet appliance; generating asecond timeline having a length corresponding to the second timeinterval; adding indicators to the second timeline at positionscorresponding to the retrieved timepoints representing when therespective activity was detected by the second Internet appliance; andgenerating a simultaneous display of the second plurality of media assetlistings, the first timeline that includes the indicators representingactivity detected by the first Internet appliance during the second timeinterval, and a second timeline that includes indicators representingactivity detected by a second Internet appliance during the second timeinterval.
 19. The system of claim 18, wherein the indicators included inthe first and second timelines include a first plurality of indicatorsof a first type and a second plurality of indicators of a second type,wherein the first plurality of indicators represent a first type ofactivity detected at different points in time, wherein the secondplurality of indicators represent a second type of activity detected atdifferent points in time, wherein the first plurality of indicators arevisually distinguished from the second plurality of indicators.
 20. Thesystem of claim 18, wherein the control circuitry is further configuredto: navigate a cursor to a first indicator that represents a firstactivity detected by the first Internet appliance; receive a userrequest to sequentially present content associated the activitiesdetected by the first and second Internet appliances starting from apoint in time associated with the first indicator; generate for displaycontent representing the first activity detected by the first Internetappliance; determine that a second indicator that represents a secondactivity detected by the second Internet appliance is positioned betweenthe first indicator and a third indicator that represents third activitydetected by the first Internet appliance; and in response to thedetermining, automatically generate for display content representing thesecond activity following the content representing the first activity.